Savior
by purdys pal
Summary: If there was ever a time Michael Westen needed a savior it was in the early summer of '94 in the mountains of Chechyna. Now Complete.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own any part of Burn Notice, this is all for fun**

**This story started life as a part of the First Times collection, but has grown into a tale that deserves it own separate identity. It is thanks to Jedi Skysinger's encouragement and Beta work that it is now ready for posting.  
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**Some details of this dark tale can be found in Jedi Skysingers brilliant story Asset Management.**

**()()**

_**This is a very dark story, inspired by part of a conversation between Michael Westen and Larry Sizemore. Which takes place during S5 ep12.**_

"_I didn't do anything in Chechyna." Michael paled as his mind fought to keep the memory repressed._

"_Is that what you tell yourself? You stood there, you let me kill those people, and then you helped me clean it up." Larry's accusation, and gloating expression broke through his defenses.  
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**()()**

**SAVIOR.  
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**If there was ever a time that Michael Westen needed a savior, it was the in the early summer of '94 in Chechyna.**

**()**

High up in the Caucasus mountains Michael Westen was running for his life. Tree branches tore at his clothes and scraped against his skin, his feet tripped and slid on the slippery uneven ground. His hands were scratched and bleeding the wounds hidden under a layer of mud from grabbing at trees, rocks and even tufts of grass all in the effort to stay upright.

All around him came the crackling noise of gunfire, and the angry shouts of his pursuers. The sounds echoing through the forest and along the valley walls made it impossible to tell from which direction they came. When a tree branch close to his face disintegrated in a shower of splinters, all he could do was increase his speed, and hope for a miracle.

His steps faltered when, several yards ahead the back of his partner Larry Sizemore's jacket suddenly erupt in a spray of blood, and the older man's body crumpled, tumbling to the ground. Leaving a fallen comrade went against the very core of Michael's beliefs, but he couldn't stop. His gun was empty and the enemy was at his heels; to stop would mean death.

Just when he thought he couldn't go on much longer he spotted salvation, a thick mist snaking its way across the valley, weaving it's way through the trees. The thought that if he could make it into the swirling low level cloud he would have a chance to escape gave him the strength to carry on.

Ignoring the bullets that came whizzing past his head, Michael concentrated solely on his plan. He would use the mist as cover, and circle back to find Larry. Then they would find a way off the mountain and back to civilization. He increased his speed, eyes firmly fixed on his destination. His mind didn't even register the impact to the back of his skull.

**()**

He woke with a start, arms and legs flailing out, hitting the walls of whatever structure he was in. Gasping for breath, he immediately started to gag at the smell that assailed his senses. Scrabbling into a sitting position his mind was filled with confusion. At first he thought something had happened to his vision. He was in total darkness. The air was cold and moist, the stench almost unbearable. He brought his hands up off the floor, they were covered in some sort of slimy material which he came to realize was rotting vegetation.

Slowly it dawned on him, he was in the bottom of a pit of some sort. As he felt around he realized the floor was deep with rotten food waste, and the walls felt like they were made of thick clay mud. Cautiously he tried to stand up, leaning against the slick wet walls, his feet unsteady on the piled up rubbish he was standing on. He stared upwards, hoping to see some sliver of light. But there was nothing.

Panic began to set in. _Had they buried him alive? Tossed him in a pit to die alone and forgotten. _Hyperventilating he clawed at the sides, His fingers dug into the mud as he desperately tried to climb out, until he lost his footing and fell back. Despondent, sitting on the floor, he rested his head on his arms. _For what they had done, maybe it was what he deserved._ _He should have at least tried to stop Larry instead of passively standing by. _

His breath hitched in his throat, as he forced himself to calm down. Panic was not going to get him out of this predicament. Larry had to be dead and nobody else knew where they were going after they left Grozny to clean up the loose ends from their most recent mission.

He was on his own now; if he was going to escape he couldn't afford to fall apart. Getting to his feet again, he felt his way around his prison. It was circular, probably no more than five feet in diameter. Standing in the centre he couldn't straighten both arms out, before they reached the walls.

A wave of dizziness sent him back to the ground, reminding him if he wanted to survive he needed to assess his injuries. Gingerly he probed his scalp. The back of his head was a mass of dried blood and in the centre was a long deep cut that still oozed fluid. He realized at some point he had taken a heavy blow to the head, which was probably what had knocked him out. His ribs, back and stomach all felt sore and bruised, as well. Whoever had captured him must have beaten him before dropping him into the pit. Staring into the darkness, he went back to thinking of a way out.

"Hey!" he tried to shout, but his voice came out in little more than a croak. Coughing he tried a again, calling out in his barely passable Chechen accent. "Please, help me. You have the wrong man. I have done nothing wrong." He waited but heard no response; only a faint rustling coming from near his feet. It was then he realized he wasn't alone. He was sharing his prison with rats, and all the bugs that were feeding on the rubbish which surrounded him.

Michael lost all track of time unable to sleep because of his cell mates. He was also becoming weakened by thirst and hunger. He continued to shout out in Chechen, determined to keep to his cover. It was all a big mistake, he was being wrongly accused, and if somebody would just talk to him they could sort it all out. He was a business man from Grozny whose car broke down on the road. In the end, though his voice gave out, and eventually so did his legs as he collapsed amongst the refuse.

He slumped against the wall, with his arms wrapped around his body. Sweating, and shaking, as a fever took hold of his body and mind. Larry's face danced in front of his eyes. "_Josef betrayed us. We have no choice but to clear up this mess as quickly and quietly as possible. He lives out in the countryside. If we go now we can be back in time for dinner." _Josef Broshev, was a minor official in the Chechen government; Larry's traitorous asset who had lied about his ability to get them the intelligence they had been sent to collect.

"Wake up! Hey you! Wake up!" Michael's eyes fluttered open at the sound of the strong Chechen dialect. Above him, a long way up he saw a narrow beam of light. He watched bemused as a bottle was lowered down on a piece of string. "Water," the voice from above told him.

With fumbling fingers, he freed the bottle from the string and gulped down the clear liquid inside. Before he could say anything, he was back in total darkness and alone once more. Gasping and choking because he drank too fast, he rested his back against the mud wall. A tiny sliver of hope entered his mind. If they were giving him water they didn't want him dead, at least not yet.

Soon though he slipped back into semi consciousness. His foot barely twitched when a rat ran across it. Josef Broshev, his eldery mother, his wife, and two children, a housekeeper and a gardener and their families. All together sixteen men, women and children, that he had helped to round up and then Larry had killed them all. What had he been thinking? He had walked away to stand guard, leaving Larry alone with the captives. He had known what was going to happen, deep down he had known, but he hadn't stopped it.

The scene that greeted him when Larry called him back to help dispose of the bodies had sickened him. Yet he had helped pile them up in the kitchen, following Larry's orders blindly. In the back of his mind he had wanted to run away screaming; instead he set the charges that would turn the house into an inferno and hide their crime.

The next time he woke up, he feebly kicked out at a rat gnawing on what remained of his right shoe, and shook his head, swiping at the flies and other bugs which were attracted to the blood still leaking from his head wound. He knew he was getting weaker all the time, he needed to make an attempt to get out before he was too weak to do anything.

Struggling back to his feet he tried to make hand holds in the walls. It was slow going, and his fingers ached as he dug them into the hard packed mud. He managed to make it ten feet up the wall, when he lost his grip and fell back, banging his head against the side and sinking into unconsciousness.

His eyes opened, but he was too weak to move. His body had curled into the fetal position, his limbs felt heavy, and numb. He wondered if he was going to die laying in rotten food waste; eaten alive by the creatures sharing his prison. His eyes began to close, there was nothing to see anyway. Sometime later a noise disturbed him, cracks and bangs, followed by shouting in Chechen, and then after a few minutes of silence another voice speaking English with a brash American accent.

Michael made an effort to sit up, but it was too much. Light flooded into his tomb from above, causing him to burying his head in his hands; his eyes were too sensitive to bare the bright flashlight illuminating his prison.

"Hey! Here he is!"

He heard the words but still didn't move. He had been having a lot of hallucinations. The welcoming sound of an American accent seemed out of place.

"Hey you! C'mon kid grab the rope we'll get you out." This was a second voice.

He ignored the rope that dangled in front of his eyes. It wasn't real, nobody was coming to rescue him.

"Damn it. Tie the end off, I'll have to climb down and get him," came the exasperated voice again.

He was barely aware of a rope being tied around his body, or being lifted up into the fresh air. He lay limp, unresponsive to the voices and the touch of hands tending to his injuries. The only indication he gave that he was alive were three words mumbled in Russian.

"I did nothing."


	2. Chapter 2

**SAVIOR. **

**A/N: A big thank you to Jedi Skysinger for all your help with this chapter.  
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**Part two.**

Lieutenant Commander Sam Axe, sat on a wooden framed chair in his Commanding officer's temporary command centre at the Incirlik Air Base, South Eastern Turkey. He had arrived with his team less than half an hour earlier and had barely been given time to get his kit off the plane before being called into a briefing.

From overhead came the faint whirr of a ceiling fan turning slowly, circulating the hot dry air that filled the makeshift office. Sam listened to his Commander's voice as he studied the contents of the file he had just been handed: reconnaissance photographs, weather reports, thermal images of troop movements in the target area; all the standard information necessary for a mission in a hostile environment.

"This is a rush job. It came across from Langley last night," his Commander explained. "Two days ago a missing CIA agent turned up at a Doctors Without Borders medical centre set up on the edge of the Russian Chechen conflict zone. He had been shot up pretty badly, two holes in his back. It took them until last night to confirm his ID."

"If they have their agent-?" Sam queried as he turned to another page, and a name jumped out at him. "_Sizemore, Larry Sizemore_?" He growled the question as he read the name of the injured agent.

"Yes. Didn't you work with him last year? Where was it, Serbia?"

"Yeah. Extracting a particularly nasty warlord." It wasn't an experience he wanted to repeat. He turned back to the file and the mission. "This mentions Chechen guerillas are rumored to have captured an American spy who they're accusing of assassinating the family of one of their government officials." _That sounded like a job Larry would relish. _Sam kept the thought to himself.

"Langley thinks they're talking about Michael Westen," his commanding officer filled in the gap.

"Larry's Kid?" Sam raised an eyebrow. He hadn't had much to do with Westen on the Serbian assignment. The only thing that had struck him was how much the young man had changed since he had first met him nearly six years earlier in Afganistan.

"I believe that's what they're calling him in intelligence circles. He was supposed to be in Grozny with Sizemore, they were there acquiring details on the status of the Chechen forces. But something went wrong. The asset is presumed dead, his house went up in flames five nights ago, and Westen and Sizemore went MIA about the same time. That is until Sizemore turned up half dead two days ago."

"So Westen is the guerillas' American spy?"

"That's the theory. Sizemore's no help the man's been unconscious since he staggered into the med centre. I need you to go in, and get Westen out before they parade him on TV, and questions start getting asked at the U.N and NATO."

Sam closed the file. The guerilla fighters making the claims were located in a very active region of the Caucasus mountains surrounded by various other factions all fighting each other. It wasn't going to be an easy extraction. "So what's the plan? A full team is going to be hard to get in, and out unseen. Didn't the rebels in that area shoot down a Russian helicopter last week?"

His commander nodded, his expression grim. "We have confirmation they've got surface to air missiles, and mortars. I'm sending in you, and the new man Van Holt to locate Westen and assess the situation. If the mission is a go I'll send in the rest of the team as support. Once the support team is on the ground, you and Van Holt will extract Westen and here's the tricky part." He paused. "The nearest LZ is fifty miles away from Westen's last known location."

"We have to carry an injured man out fifty miles. Through hostile territory?"

His commander nodded. "I know it's going to be tough. The whole area is in flux, but that's the nearest safe LZ for a Blackhawk. You'll be dodging both Chechen, and Russian rebel forces as well as Russian military all the way out." He paused again this time though his expression changed to one of distaste. "So with that in mind if you think Westen is too badly injured to move or you can't reach him, order Van Holt to set the laser targeting system and we'll send in a drone."

Sam pursed his lips unhappy with this final order. But after a moment, he nodded. It was a sad fact of the job you couldn't always save the day. If they couldn't get Westen out safely they were to obliterate him. If there was no body, there could be no embarrassing questions at the UN or in Congress.

**()**

The rear of the military cargo plane was empty except for the two men who sat opposite each other carefully making the final checks to all their equipment. Sam finished tightening the straps that crossed his chest, making sure his parachute was firmly in place for the high altitude jump he was about to take. Glancing up he studied his team mate, the new guy in his SEAL team Harlan Van Holt.

"How many jumps have you done Harlan?" Sam shouted over the noise of the aircraft.

The younger man looked up, from where he was doing his own checks. "Oh I lost count after the first hundred and fifty. I love to jump, man," he shouted back. "I did some base jumping on my last leave, just like flying." He grinned, as he tightened up his harness and then picked up his rifle. "I tell you, I love this job. Jumping outta planes and getting to shoot stuff up, there's nothing better."

_Shoot stuff up! _Sam gritted his teeth and got to his feet, just listening to Harlan made him feel old. He tried to remember when he had last been so enthusiastic. In his mid thirties, he woke up every morning with aches and pains from years of putting his body through abuse. He trained every day, and watched what he ate to keep up with men ten years younger than himself.

The aircraft crewman came down to where they stood, running his own check over their jump equipment, waiting for them to attach their oxygen masks in place before opening the doors. As the cold air hit him in the face, Sam couldn't help the grin that spread across his face. Who was he kidding? He was thirty six years old and he was about to jump out of plane and go 'shoot stuff up' and get to rescue an injured man. And he couldn't think of a single thing he would rather be doing.

Sam and Harlan left the plane free falling only a short distance before opening their chutes. They came in silently five miles away from the spot where it was believed Westen was being hidden. Sam guiding them in with the GPS attached to his wrist.

Once they landed they quickly stripped away the harnesses, and gathered up the material of the parachutes hiding the evidence of their arrival under nearby bushes. Without taking a break Sam led the way towards the coordinates where they believed Westen was being held. Moving down the mountainside Sam set as fast a pace as was safe. The satellite photographs they had studied before leaving had helped them plan a route down the mountain that would hopefully let them avoid contact with any of the guerilla bands between them and their target.

As they neared the coordinates they slowed, creeping forward when they heard the soft crackle of a camp fire and the faint murmur of male voices. Sam pointed out a small knoll overlooking the camp. Almost on their bellies, knives at the ready the two men slipped past a dozing sentry to reach Sam's designated sniper perch.

Laying flat both men stared down at the camp below. With Harlan acting as spotter, keeping an eye out for anybody trying to sneak up on their position Sam fitted a thermal imaging scope to his rifle and scanned the area. It took him a little while to work out the lay out of the camp, and how many men made up the group.

"I think I've found him. If I'm right he's underground, and looks in a bad way." Sam whispered, keeping his eye on the unmoving figure, whose shape and body heat seemed to be mixed with whatever he was laying on.

After a moment Sam shifted back and handed Harlan the rifle. "How many men down there?" Sam asked. He had done his own count but waited for confirmation.

"Forty five maybe more with the sentries." Harlan confirmed Sam's own count and went back to watching the camp through the scope.

Sucking in his cheeks Sam knew if he was following his orders to the letter, the fact whoever was in that pit was barely alive and guarded by fifty armed men was sufficient reason to tell Harlan to fix the targeting laser and for them to be on their way. While a drone locked on to it's target and destroyed the whole camp.

The trouble was, Sam hated the idea of leaving a fallen man to that fate; killed to protect a bunch of politicians from having to answer difficult questions. He took up a set of binoculars and studied the surrounding terrain. He had an idea for an extraction, if it worked they would get away safely and it would make a good story at some later date. If it went wrong, they would all be dead and it wouldn't matter to them if a few politicians got raked over the coals.

"Keep watch. I'm going to make the call." Sam ordered, his decision made. "We'll do the extraction tonight. While we wait we need to set up a diversion so we can clear the camp. With everybody off chasing their tails in the dark we can get in and get him out."

"Cool." Harlan grinned. He had just completed a night time high altitude jump and now he was going to set explosives. Down in the camp he had spotted a man with a bazooka. With a bit of luck that particular weapon would be in his hands later that night.

While Sam made the call to bring in the rest of his team, Harlan kept watch on the camp. Afterwards Sam took over the surveillance, his attention fixed on the young spy, whose body moved just enough to convince Sam he had made the right decision. Meanwhile Harlan started preparing the explosives for planting.

At eighteen hundred hours Sam received word the rest of his team was en route. Their ETA was for twenty two hundred. The sky was already beginning to darken. Most of the men in the camp were sitting down to eat around the three small camp fires. So far in the twelve hours they had been watching the camp nobody had approached the pit holding the prisoner.

"Ok Harlan lets get this show on the road." Sam shifted backwards until he was clear of the knoll.

Harlan's pearly white teeth seemed to glow against the dark of his camouflage face paint as a grin split his face almost in two. Separating, they approached the camp from different sides, taking care of the sentries guarding the camp and planting their booby traps on the way to their positions.

When the call came through just after twenty two hundred hours to say the support team was on the ground both men pressed their detonators setting off the first round of charges.

All around the camp loud booms sent up clouds of earth and tree roots. The noise could be heard for miles ricocheting off the valley walls. To add to the confusion Sam and Harlan fired their rifles into the camp. As soon as everybody in the camp came running out, they moved in silently, easily removing the last few men left to stand guard.

Harlan pulled the heavy wooden cover off the pit holding the prisoner. "Hey there he is," he called out, shining a flashlight into the hole.

"Hey you! C'mon kid grab the rope. We'll get you out." Sam peered downwards, his eyes watering at the stench. He gritted his teeth when Westen flinched away from the rope they sent down.

"Damn it. Tie the end off, I'll have to climb down and get him." He handed the other end of the rope to Harlan to tie off. He really didn't want to go into the hole but saw no choice.

Trying his best not to breathe in the putrid air Sam gathered up the limp body of the wounded spy and fixed the rope around his chest. Once he had Westen secured he climbed out and then pulled him out.

Sam Axe looked at the bloody, and stinking body laying before him. Under the dim firelight Larry's Kid looked to be dying. Covered in filth, he had a massive laceration to the back of his skull, which was full of infection.

"Sir, we need to get going before they regroup. Is he ready to move?" Harlan was keeping watch as Sam made an initial assessment. The last of their explosive charges had gone off and the rebels could be rushing back at any time.

"He will be soon." Sam replied, cleaning the kid's arm as best he could, he put in an IV, sending fluids antibiotics and pain killers into his patient's body. Hunting around he found a sheet of tarpaulin and placed the body onto it and then the two of them carried Michael's limp body between them; leaving as fast as they could.

They kept moving, dodging the patrols searching for them. At one point Sam ordered a stop and called for a Med Evac but got told it wasn't happening. The area they were in was too dangerous. The original orders stood. They had to meet up with the rest of the team and carry Westen out fifty miles to what was considered a safe zone.

"It's no good the original orders stand." Sam muttered. He quickly checked his maps. "There's a series of caves half a mile up that slope. We can hide out up there while I get Westen stabilized."

By midnight they were hiding in one of the many caves that peppered the mountainside. Michael lay shivering, but cleaned up dressed loosely in one of Sam's spare uniforms. Sam was changing the IV bags unhappy with the yellow tinge to the white of the young spy's eyes.

"I did nothing!" Michael was talking in his sleep again. "Nothing I could do. Larry, damn it Larry why'd ya do it." His voice turned to a whine, as his hand moved to rip out the catheter from his arm.

"No you don't." Sam moved fast, catching his patient's hand in time and pining it down. For a brief moment Michael struggled and then felt back into a deep sleep.

Sam looked at the tortured expression on the injured man's face, wondering exactly what had Larry done.


	3. Chapter 3

**Savior.**

**A/N: A big thank you to Jedi Skysinger for her Beta work on this chapter, and for allowing me to use her original character Rayna Kopac soon to make an appearance in Asset Management.**

**Now Michael has been rescued, this is another dark chapter which contains more about what happened in the house belonging to Josef Broshev.**

**Part Three,**

Sam Axe sat in the entrance to the cave they were using as a hideout, keeping watch on the valley that stretched out below him. In the darkness, the flashlights of their Chechen pursuers could be seen clearly; sending out dancing beams of light that flickered in between the tall spruce trees. Occasionally a shout rang out as their trackers found clues to the direction taken by the men who had stolen away their prisoner.

Sam shifted uneasily. He could hear the voices of the search party getting closer. It had been impossible to completely mask their trail; two men carrying a third on a makeshift tarpaulin stretcher while holding weapons. It had been all they could do to stay ahead of the search parties.

He glanced behind him back into the cave, his eyes picking out Harlan's sleeping form sitting propped up against the cave wall. He had ordered his team mate to rest up before the remainder of the team arrived. There was no point in them both being tired.

From another part of the cave, dimly lit with glow sticks, came the agitated voice of the rescued spy.

"I did nothing. Nothing. I shoulda stopped ya. I shoulda..."

With a sigh, Sam wearily got to his feet. At least Westen was speaking English now. But it didn't help that the kid was getting louder. Reaching the figure still laying on the makeshift stretcher, but now wrapped in both his and Harlan's blankets, Sam put a hand on the younger man's shoulder.

"Hey Westen, you've got to be quiet." Sam kept his voice low, barely above a whisper.

"Larry?" Westen asked weakly.

"No, Sam Axe. Do you remember me?"

Any hope that Westen was coming out of his delirium was squashed as the injured spy's eyes closed again and he went back to mumbling in a mixture of English, Chechen and Russian.

Sitting back on his heels, Sam took a moment to think about what he was hearing. The parts he could understand made his blood run cold. He knew the sort of operations Larry attracted. The man was notorious. His total lack of morals and scruples were ideal for the types of jobs the higher ups sent his way. But Sam could see first-hand the effect that working alongside Larry was having on the younger man.

Just before the Serbian assignment, he had discovered through one of his many contacts in the intelligence community the reason why they called Michael Westen "Larry's Kid." He was being groomed to be the company's next Larry Sizemore, the CIA's next unstoppable bastard; there to take on all the dirty jobs. The trouble was that Michael Westen wasn't a psychopath.

"I did nothing, nothing. I wasn't there."

He was off again.

"Hey. Shh, quiet," Sam urged, tucking the blankets tighter around Michael's body, before moving back to the cave entrance to check on the position of the fast approaching enemy.

**()()**

_I did nothing. Nothing. I shoulda stopped ya. I shoulda tried. Why'd ya do it, Lare?_

_Blood, there was blood pooling about the bodies; the floor in the corner of the large kitchen was slippery with the viscous fluid. The accusing eyes of a ten year old child staring up at him straight into his soul._

_How could you let this happen? You could have stopped him. You knew what he was going to do. He had been building up to this for the last year. You should have reported him after Kiev. _

_I did nothing. I wasn't there. There was nothing I could do. You think I can stop Larry doing what he wants?_

_"What, Kid? They call it 'wet work' for a reason." _

_Larry smiled as he let Broshev's body tumble to the floor. _

_We're unstoppable, a couple of unstoppable sons of bitches. Nobody else gets the job done as well as us; the Company's 'go to' guys. _

_Blood on his hands, under his nail, ingrained into his skin. An old lady, her body as light as a bird, is placed with all the others. God, what have we become? Maybe he should just stop. Stop Larry. _

_He reached under his left arm for his gun. _

_Larry's eyes were on him, still sparkling with the light of the kill, his mouth twisted into a knowing smile. _

_"Go for it, Kid." The smile urged him to close his hand around the handle and pull the weapon._

"_You can't do it, can you? You need old Lare, dontcha, Kid? Deep down you know they all had to die. Nobody's supposed to know about US involvement. The guy was going to sell us out to the Russians.'_

"_It's the job. Kill or be killed. If you think about it, you would have killed them all yourself. I just saved you the trouble."_

_I did nothing, nothing. I wasn't there._

"_Oh c'mon, since when did you become so squeamish? I've seen you with blood on your hands."_

_He can't clean the blood off. The deep red that stains the floor is on his hands and however much he tries to rub it away, he knows it's there. _

"_They call it wet work for a reason."_

"Hey, Westen, you've gotta be quiet."

"Larry?" _Larry was there? Larry was dead._

"No. It's Sam Axe. Do you remember me?"

_Sam Axe? Axe was in Serbia. No, this was far worse than Serbia. _

_Deep breaths. Deep breaths. He forces himself to concentrate on the job._

_Pull yourself together. Set the charges and get out. There is nothing you can do about it, he scolds himself. He has seen worse. In Serbia, he had seen a lot worse. This time though they were the ones committing the atrocity._

'_I did nothing.' How many times had he heard that excuse? _

"_Aren't you done yet? C'mon, Kid, get yer head outta your ass. It's the job. Some people live, some people die. The man was a goddamn traitor. He. Lied. To. Us. He lied to his own country. Stop your damn bellyaching. It isn't you and it's damn annoying." _

_The last piece of RDX was set. On the press of a button, there would be nothing left. _

_Desolation, numbness and a deep dark feeling in the pit of his stomach. They were unstoppable, they were proud of that title, he had been proud of that title. Now he just wished somebody would stop them both._

_I did nothing. Nothing. I wasn't there._

**()**

"Hey. Shhh, quiet." The stranger's voice brought him out of his nightmare.

The cool fresh air, the feeling of a rough blanket against his skin- all signs that he had been pulled out of hell. He lifted his hands, turning them slowly before his eyes. Even though it wasn't there, he could still see it, the blood of innocents. He deserved to be in hell.

_He heard the muffled sobs of frightened children, of women begging Josef Broshev to tell the mad foreign devils what they wanted to hear. He heard the soft noise of Larry's silenced hand gun and the thud of another body hitting the ground. _

_He stood in the kitchen staring at the broken bodies and into the dull lifeless eyes of their victims. He handed Larry the detonator. "Let's get this over with."_

"_Oh, cheer up, Kid. I ordered a champagne supper for when we get back and requested that those two pretty waitresses from last night serve it up."_

_The farmhouse disintegrated in a fiery fireball, wood and stone and slate all gone in less than a second. "Good job, Kid," Larry enthused. "Good job."_

_There was nothing left. They had never been there. He had never been there. He had done nothing._

"You're safe. Another hour and my team will be here and we'll get you back home," the stranger's voice woke him from his nightmare.

"Home?" Michael asked, his mouth feeling strange. Running his tongue over his lips, he felt cracked tender skin. In the dim light of a couple of glow sticks, he vaguely recognized the man watching over him as a friend.

"Yeah, home, kid," Sam smiled. This was better.

"Don't call me that," Michael snapped. "Don't call me Kid."

"O-kay, how about Mike or do you want me to stick to Westen?" He was pretty sure he could wipe brain damage off the list of the kid's complications. Now if the whites of Westen's eyes would just lose the faint yellowing, he would be able to remove liver damage from the list as well.

"Mike's fine."

_Tiredness was pulling him back under. He didn't want to go. He could already see tiny hands holding a cream colored teddy bear waiting for him in the darkness._

**()**

"How's he doin', sir?"

Sam turned to look up at his subordinate. "A bit better. You're supposed to be catching up on your sleep."

"I'm fine, sir, ready to go."

Sam glanced at his watch. It was nearly time to make a move anyway. "Ok, let's get ready to move out."

He got to his feet, walking over to check on the valley below. The lights had vanished; the area looked quiet. Sam's eyes followed the soundless flight of a great grey owl circling above the trees, hunting prey that was scurrying about in the undergrowth far below. Suddenly, it dropped from the sky zeroing in on its next meal; a sure sign there were no Chechens laying in wait.

He had ordered the support team to lure the search parties away from his position and it looked like the strategy had worked. It was safe now for them to leave the cave and make their way towards the LZ fifty miles away. The support team would rendezvous with them shortly after daylight and from then on it would be a hard slog to safety. If all went well, he estimated they would be back at base drinking beers in forty eight hours.

**US Airbase, Incirlik Southern Eastern Turkey.**

Larry Sizemore woke up in a hospital bed. Instantly alert, he feigned unconsciousness while he worked out what was happening. He watched through slitted eyes as a US military nurse attached a variety of monitoring equipment to his arms. The throb coming from his shoulder wound told him they had already examined that injury and the feel of a dressing being firmly placed over his left hip alerted him to a second person in the room, probably a doctor.

He had obviously slept through the transfer from the Doctors Without Borders facility. The well meaning doctors had been easy to fool; acting dazed and confused had gotten him two days respite. Then, after they had treated his wounds, he had finally told them his name and who to contact. Now that he was back he was going to have explain the blown mission and how his partner had died; his body left in enemy hands.

He kept up his ruse until he was left alone with only the steady beeping of the heart monitor machine for company. He ran through the final hours of the mission, trying to decide where things went wrong.

_The slight chill in the air, the light mist snaking in between the trees, even the dampness in the air all added to the anticipation of the kill. They were a couple of predators on the hunt, top of the food chain, nobody stood in their way; at least nobody who wanted to live._

_Having lured the first of the unsuspecting guards into an ambush, Larry stood back to watch his Kid go to work. He grinned wolfishly at the way his protégé took down the first man. It was a classic Michael Westen move: quick and without an ounce of mercy. The snapping of the guard's neck had sounded like the crack of a twig under the sole of a boot. It had actually helped to direct the second guard over to their position. _

_Ah, and then the second man, that one had warmed his heart. The way Michael had stepped from the shadows strangling the guy with his bare hands. It had reminded Larry of a younger version of himself. There was nothing like an up close kill, feeling the life leave the body of an enemy. _

"Who the hell authorized sedating Sizemore? I need him up and answering questions."

Larry was jerked awake by angry voices coming from outside his room. Rayna Kopec? _What the hell was she doing here? _Lifting his head slightly, he saw the door to his room swinging shut. _The bitch must have been standing over him. _

"The doctors at the DWB dosed him for transport Ma'am. I've already spoken to Captain Cooper, he says Agent Sizemore should wake up soon." That sounded like one of the 'bitches' pups, probably some college kid fresh out of Camp Perry.

"While we wait for Agent Sizemore to join us, I want to you to find out exactly what happened in Grozny and get me every single scrap of intel we have on Josef Broshev. Then set a fire under every intelligence source we have in the region."

"Ma'am."

"It was a goddamn fact finding mission and now I've got two agents down and a literally blown asset! ..Why are you still standing here? Go!"

Larry couldn't help the hint of a smile that curved his lips. Station Chief Kopac was pissed.

"Ma'am - I - I have put the Broshev file on your desk, and all I've already requested the Grozny source send a report in ASAP."

Larry sneered he was a right, a college kid. What was the Agency doing hiring goddamn glorified office clerks?

"Thank you, Steven." At least the clerk had shut Kopac up for once.

He heard the pair begin to walk away.

"Now, go make sure Captain Cooper understands that I want to know as soon as Sizemore is capable of stringing two words together and find out the ETA on Westen's arrival."

So the bitch was here to speak to him. Well, Station Chief Rayna Kopac would just have to wait until _ he_ was ready to speak to her. She might be his boss now, but as far as he was concerned, it was _her_ job to deal with the all the little obstructions and annoyances that got in the way of him operating in the field.

Laying back he began his own mental debrief. As near as he could workout, it had been six days since the wild chase through the forest. His lips twitched into a small smile. He had thought the kid was dead. It seemed like he wasn't the only one hard to kill.

Blue eyes narrowed in concentration as Larry began to go through all the possible scenarios.

_If_ Michael had been in the hands of the enemy all that time, was he any sort of condition to give a report? He had heard the cries from their pursuers. They had been shouting about capturing one of the assassins. So, yes, Michael had been captured and Kopec obviously thought he was up to answering questions.

So then came the next question.

If Michael was capable of talking, would he? No, the Kid would keep quiet just like he was doing.

That was the benefit of training somebody, you knew their every move. Michael would keep his mouth shut while he worked out how much trouble he was in. Because as much as the kid might try to deny it, he might as well have been pulling the trigger himself. What happened in that house was a necessity, but the bleeding hearts in DC wouldn't see it that way.

_Michael had handed him the detonator. "Let's get this over with." He was still pouting, acting like a damn woman over a little bit of spilt blood._

"_Oh cheer up, Kid. I ordered a champagne supper for when we get back and requested that those two pretty waitresses from last night serve it up." He had tried to lighten the situation, but he was losing his patience. _

_Flicking the switch, the farmhouse had disintegrated in a magnificent fireball, wood and stone and slate all gone in less than a second. In that moment, he had forgiven Michael for his sulking._

"_Good job, Kid," he had enthused. Nobody could say that Larry Sizemore didn't give credit where it was due._

Staring up at the ceiling, Larry grinned, remembering the scene of destruction. He doubted there was one brick left onto top of another in that little compound. _Damn Michael was good with explosives. _ It was a skill he had never bothered with. He preferred his kills to be up close in person or, if that wasn't possible, from a distance with a sniper rifle or poison. Bombs were pretty, but made one hell of a mess. On the upside, they also destroyed all incriminating evidence.

He relaxed, that was it. All the evidence was destroyed. The only people left alive who knew what happened was Michael and himself. He just had to decide on what that truth was and make sure The Kid repeated it

()()


	4. Chapter 4

**Savior.**

**A/N: A big thank you to everybody who has reviewed this story or put it on your alerts. A special thank you to Jedi Skysinger for her beta work and for lending me one of her original characters.**

**Part Four.**

In the foothills of the Caucasus Mountains, the morning sun was slowly rising higher in the sky, the warmth burning away the last lingering tendrils of an early morning mist. Under the vast canopy of mature spruce trees, rays of sunlight were breaking through in between the branches to send out flickering shadows across the forest floor, helping to camouflage the eight men who were moving stealthily through the heavily wooded terrain. The only sound betraying their presence was made by the soft squelch of their booted feet as they travelled over the damp slippery ground. Suddenly, the man in the lead held up a fisted hand and they all came to an immediate stop and in unison all silently sank down to the ground.

Moving slowly, Sam Axe crept forward to the lead man's side and followed the line of his arm to where he pointed out a stocky man and a young boy walking without a care along a forest trail. The man was carrying an axe, and the boy was pulling a simple wooden sledge, presumably to drag the logs they were going to cut back to their home. The SEAL team waited in silence for the man and boy to move away and then continued on, even more cautiously than before.

An hour later Sam called a halt, sending two men off to scout the route towards the LZ and ordering the rest to spread out and keep watch while he checked on the casualty. Crouching down beside Westen, Sam set up fresh bags of IV fluids and antibiotics. Then he turned to the nasty task of checking out the head wound. Removing the sticky foul smelling dressing, he noticed fresh infection leaking from the swollen discolored laceration. After cleaning out the pus, he dropped all the equipment he had used into a plastic bag and placed it all into his back pack. As in any covert mission, they were leaving nothing of themselves behind.

As he finished off, he noticed Westen was watching him through pain filled eyes. "Hey Westen, how are you feeling?"

"Fine," the younger man mumbled, trying to look around but stopping when the slight movement rubbed at the wound. "Where are we?" he queried.

"We're on our way out of Chechnya. What do you remember?" Sam asked, pleased to see the fever had broken as the antibiotics worked their magic on the infection.

"I'm not sure, everything is kinda hazy," Michael replied, his eyes sliding shut before he forced them open again.

"Hazy, huh?" Sam returned, his tone letting Westen know he wasn't fooled at all.

"Yeah, hazy." Michael agreed, his eyes sliding shut again.

Sam sat back on his heels, a worried frown on his face. Westen's delirium fuelled confession had been playing on his mind ever since he had heard the first garbled plea of _"Why'd ya do it, Larry?"_ There was no way that the younger man could have forgotten what had happened back in that farmhouse. Clearing his throat, Sam gently touched Michael's shoulder.

"Er, listen Mike, you should think about it. If Sizemore did something-"

Michael's eyes snapped open, his expression cold and angry. "Nothing happened... I - I would have remembered... We didn't do anything."

A little taken aback by the look in the younger man's eyes, Sam dropped the subject. If Westen thought this matter would end out in the wilds of Chechnya he was going to be in for a nasty shock when he got back to the airbase.

"Why don't you get some more sleep?" Sam suggested, doing his best to hide his disappointment at Michael's subterfuge.

_"You've pulled a job with Larry Sizemore? Well good luck with that." Sam had looked at his buddy from Military Intelligence and frowned._

"_What's that supposed to mean? Hell, I know the guy __is a ghoul..."_

"_Ghoul? Ha! That's putting it mildly. __Jeez, you should check out who you're working, Sam. The guy is goddamn notorious."_

"_I've worked with Sizemore before. __I'd never do it again voluntarily, but hey, orders are orders. __Yeah, he's a loose canon, but..." Privately, he had always suspected Sizemore was more like a freelance psychopath, but he'd never really had any real proof._

"_I mean it, Sam.__There's plenty of scuttlebutt floating around about Sizemore...__And you know about __this Kid of his?"_

"_Michael Westen? Yeah, I __worked with him __years a go __in Kuwait and Panama. He's a good man."_

_The Ranger had saved his ass in Kuwait. He remembered his own reaction to the changes in the younger man since he'd become a spy as he had taken in __his buddy's expression. "Why, what have you heard?"_

"Sir? We're ready to move out." Sam pulled himself back to the present. He was getting tired. He looked up at Harlan, who was watching him closely. Had the new man on the team noticed his inattention?

"Right." Sam got to his feet and gestured for his team to move out. He watched as Harlan and Carson picked up the makeshift stretcher and the whole team began to move off.

_"Well let's just say Sizemore's finally found a kindred spirit."_

Sam took up a rearguard position. Was his buddy right? Was Westen really just Larry's Kid, nothing more than weapon at the disposal of his CIA masters.

**()()**

Larry woke up to the sound of a metal chair being dragged across the linoleum flooring. Moving carefully, he sat up locking eyes with a nervous looking young man wearing brand new fatigues and the shiniest pair of laced boots he had ever seen. This, he guessed, was Kopec's pup,_ "What did she call him? Steven?"_ The kid looked even younger than he had expected.

The young man flushed under Larry's gaze, reminding the spy of a deer caught in the headlights. He did nothing to set the man at ease, smirking when finally the younger man dropped his eyes to the floor and hurriedly finished setting up a metal table and a chair next to the bed. Satisfied that Kopec's latest pup knew his place, Larry leaned back against his pillows and ignored the young man while he waited for Station Chief Kopec to put in an appearance.

He had faced a countless number of debriefs over the years and nearly every one of them was a waste of time. All the Bureau Chiefs and politicians were interested in was the final results. Nobody wanted the full details of his assignments written down. Plausible deniability was a by-word for most of the jobs sent his way. _So why was Kopec so eager to get his statement this time?_

The pup suddenly jumped and Larry's attention snapped to the door as it swung open and Station Chief Rayna Kopec walked into the room. Larry studied her appearance; she was dressed for working in the field. Her long dark blonde hair hung down her back in a thick braid. Her fatigues, unlike her pup's, were faded and worn. He tried to think of the last time he had seen her in anything other than power suits and high heels.

"Agent Sizemore." She spoke crisply, her cobalt blue eyes cool, calm and focused.

"Station Chief Kopec. You shouldn't have bothered." He smirked, barring his teeth in an insincere smile when he saw her brow crease in irritation.

Sitting down on the steel framed chair, she rested her arms on the table and leaned forward.

"This is just a preliminary report on your recent actions in Grozny... Care to explain how a simple fishing expedition turned into such a colossal screw up?" Now she returned his smile.

_The bitch thought she had one over on him. He'd soon show her._

"Is he old enough to be listening to an adult conversation?" Larry glanced up at Kopec's aide.

"Let's just get this over with, shall we?" she replied. Flipping open a notepad, she looked up at him, waiting for to speak.

"A screw up? That's a bit unfair." He crossed his arms over his chest, managing to hide how much the movement hurt his shoulder.

"Oh, I think I'm being very fair with my assessment. The asset is dead and his home destroyed. Westen was captured close to the scene and somehow identified as an American spy. We have alienated potential allies and have given our adversaries ammunition to use against us. In what way was your assignment a success?"

_Oh, so she was going to play it like that, was she? Trying to pin the blame on good ol' Larry Sizemore for her own foul up._

"It was _your_ talent spotters who put us on to Broshev." Larry put the blame firmly where he believed it belonged. "_We_ followed protocol and made contact. It was only because of my experience that I picked up something was wrong with the asset and it was _my_ decision to bug his home and office. It was because of this,_ I_ discovered he was in fact a FSB asset."

"Are you telling me Broshev was employed by the Russians?" She raised an eyebrow.

"That's exactly what I'm telling you, _honey_. If it wasn't for me, the Russians would be setting us up the first time we tried to help our so-called allies."

Larry watched as Kopec leaned back in her chair, her eyes fixed on his face trying to calculate the truth of his statement.

"So what made you suspicious?" she asked.

"He was too eager to help," Larry replied. "So when we went out to his home, I kept him talking while the Ki-Agent Westen bugged various parts of the house, including the phone. It was two days later we heard him talking on the phone, discussing turning two Americans over to his FSB handler."

"And why didn't you pass this intel back up the line?" Kopec demanded. "We could have turned Broshev, or used him to pass on disinformation."

"Because, I am an experienced agent and I knew you would require more proof than a recorded conversation and I was positive I could turn the man far quicker than anybody else you've got working in the region." He paused, turning to lock his cold gaze on the Station Chief's pup. "I am _very_ good at making people change their minds." Seeing the young man pale under his threatening gaze warmed Larry's heart.

"Leave him alone, Sizemore," Kopec warned, but there was a slight smile on her lips. "So you planned to turn Broshev?"

"That was the idea. However, the man pulled a gun on us as soon as we arrived at his home."

"And neither you or Westen, two very experienced agents, could disarm him safely?" Disbelief was plain in her voice.

"He had his bodyguards behind us," Larry answered smoothly. "We were out numbered."

"Let me get this straight. You're telling me two highly trained operatives, who on their last mission took apart a full Spetsnaz team, let a lowly government official and two of his servants hold them captive?"

"I wanted to bring Broshev in. Exposing him as a traitor would have helped your negotiations with the Chechens. But the man was crazed. We ended up having to fight our way out. We only just reached our car when the whole house blew up. Broshev is the only one who could have done it."

"So, you're telling me Broshev killed himself and his family?" Larry could tell she didn't believe him.

"He must have. Hey, we barely got out with our lives! The explosion brought the guerrillas down from the mountain and they blew up our car. We had to make our escape on foot."

"So what happened next? How did you get separated?"

"In the trees, they were coming at us from all angles. I was shot and went down. I don't know what happened after that." He smiled at her, all teeth and a mocking light in his eyes. _She had no choice but to take his word for it. Most of it was true anyway and, once the Kid confirmed the story, Kopec would be ordered to sit on her doubts. Besides, it was her fault they were put at risk. It was her researchers who had fouled up. Hell, if he played this right he might even get her censured._

"It's a nice story, Sizemore, very nice. Do you have proof of any of this?"

His smile widened further. "Well yes, I do, _sweetie pie_. The recording should still be in the hotel room..Under the skirting boards. Third board along under the window."

At the 'sweetie pie' comment, Kopec was on her feet, the chair skidding back and toppling over. She leaned across the table, her professional demeanor wiped away by Larry's disrespect. "Station Chief, boss, or even Ma'am, Larry. You use any other form of address again, I'll have you up on report so damn quick, it'll knock that smile round to the other side of your face."

Larry hid his surprise at her outburst. Usually nothing he said or did flustered Kopec. He pursed his lips, this was interesting... She was rattled... Angry... Well, livid was a more precise word. The Ice Queen had never lost her cool like that before. He had always known the job would be too much for her, too much responsibility.

"And this is what you intend to put in your official report?" she snapped.

"Yes, Ma'am." He smirked, watching her as she fought to bring herself back under control.

"I'll send a recovery team back to the room and get the recordings." She turned away. "For your sake, you better hope the recordings are still there." She headed for the door, with the pup in tow.

Larry lay back. That went exceedingly well, he thought.

"Contact the retrieval team. I want that hotel room torn apart." He could hear Kopec angrily snapping out orders as she walked away from his room. "And check the ETA on Westen."

Closing his eyes, Larry started to plan his next moves._ He had to make sure he got to talk to Michael before Kopec had a chance to get her claws into him. He needed to make sure the Kid had his head screwed on straight __before__ that meeting took place._

The door to his room swung open and he looked up, smiling pleasantly at the nurse who had entered to change his dressings._ Time to make nice with all the little people._

**()()**

They came across the abandoned hunting lodge in a small clearing. The roof had a large gaping hole in it, all the glass was gone from the windows and the door hung off rusted up hinges. But it had four thick stone walls to provide cover and a wooden floor which meant they could stay off the damp ground. It would do as a place to rest up.

So while two of the team stayed back watching over Westen, the rest of the team had surrounded and then moved in to secure the derelict building. Once they had been sure the place was deserted, the two who had stayed behind carried the wounded spy inside.

They moved like a well oiled machine. Each man knew his job and there was no need for Sam to issue orders. A rotation was decided on for guard duty and afterwards they settled down quickly to eat, drink and then catch up on some much needed rest.

"Hey Mike, you awake?"

Sam knelt down next to the injured spy. Westen had been very quiet ever since their talk earlier in the day. Each time they had stopped, he had watched as Westen had feigned sleep while he had replaced the dressing to his head wound and changed the bags of IV fluids and meds.

"Yeah," came the murmured reply.

"Good." He sat down beside him. "So, how are you feeling now?"

"I'm fine."

"Yeah, you sound it," Sam answered.

Michael swallowed, and for the first time since the morning, made eye contact. "I want to say, er - thanks. Thanks for coming to get me. How did you know where to find me?"

"The men holding you were threatening to parade you on TV for the murder of one of their officials. Langley made a point of finding your location." He gave Michael a hint of the trouble waiting for him.

"I didn't - nothing hap.."

Sam's expression hardened. "You should know. While you were out of it, just after we risked our lives to pull you out of that hole. You talked...You talked a lot."

"I- you -" Michael stuttered as he looked everywhere but at the man facing him.

Sam gripped the spy's shoulder, tightening his grip until Michael looked at him. "The death of that man and his family has caused a lot of heat back home. You need to pull yourself together. There are a lot of people wanting answers about what happened in that house." He watched as Westen's face paled. "You need to stop lying to yourself and stop protecting Larry Sizemore before he pulls you down with him."

"Larry's alive?" Westen's voice cracked.

"Last I heard," Sam answered.

Westen's eyes slid shut. After a moment, Sam turned away. He couldn't order Westen to speak out against his partner. He just had to hope he would do the right thing when they got back. Running his fingers through his hair, Sam rested his back against the wall. Whatever Westen did or didn't do was not his concern. His job was to get the injured spy back to Incirlik airbase and then his own superiors would decide what to do with him.

**()**


	5. Chapter 5

**Savior.**

**A/N: A big thank you to everyone who has reviewed this story or put it on alert or favorite lists. A special thank you as always to Jedi Skysinger for all her help with this story and for her beta work.**

**Part Five,**

Grozny_ in 1994 was a dangerous place, it was a city preparing for a siege. Chechen militia patrolled the streets in search of covert Russian forces. The majority of the shops were shut down. The few that did open had very little to sell as the Russians forces surrounding the outer territories had stopped supplies getting in. The only people making money were the black marketeers. _

_The hotel where they were staying had once been a smart, five star establishment. Now the lack of paying customers had led to a reduction in staff and no money to keep on top of repairs. The whole place had an air of neglect._

_Upstairs on the third floor, Larry was pacing back and forth, his face suffused with anger. _

_"He betrayed us. You heard him he's planning to sell us out. The man is a goddamn traitor. He deserves to die." The long bladed throwing knife in his hand suddenly flew through the air, ending up embedded to the hilt in the wooded door._

"_So what do we do? Take him out on his way home?" Michael asked from where he sat next to a small writing desk, his hand resting on top of the receiver that had just relayed the bad news. Josef Broshev was making a deal with the Russians for the chance of a new home and a fresh start in Volgograd._

"_No... Go collect the RDX from the safe house." Larry's eyes glinted with malice. "Remember our orders, Kid. Nobody is supposed to know we're here. His whole house has to go, unless you fancy going back to collect all the bugs you planted."_

"_You want to blow the house?" Michael raised an eyebrow in surprise, Larry usually preferred a more personal touch in his assassinations._

"_I want to finish this job and get back to civilization," Larry spat back, his anger unabated. He pointed an accusing finger at his young associate. "You know we only got this assignment because you couldn't control your temper."_

"_That is so unfair. I..." Michael protested, but was cut off._

"_Oh, please, you lost your temper, Kid, and then to cap it all you got sloppy. Six kills and 'Michael Westen' is suddenly a code word for a black ops team."_

"_But..." _

"_Forget about it," Larry waved a hand in dismissal. "I'm sure you learned your lesson. Just go get the explosives while I sort out the details on how we're gonna clear up this mess."_

_He guessed it was at that moment he knew things were going to get bloody. But he had pushed those thoughts away. It was the job. It was what they were paid to do. It was what they signed up for. _

"_What's one life to the hundreds we save? Some people live, some people die." He had lost count how many times he had listened to that lecture._

_Broshev had sealed his fate the second he made a deal to help ambush the two American spies. He deserved everything he got. By the time they were ready to leave for the traitor's farmhouse, he had already justified what was about to happen. It was necessary. Sometimes you had to do bad things. Broshev had betrayed them. It was his own fault._

_He just hadn't realized how far Larry was going to go. He shouldn't have killed the children...No, he wasn't going to think about that. He wasn't there, he didn't see it... He did nothing.._

_But now Sam Axe was hinting that he knew what had happened._

"_You should know, while you were out of it, just after we risked our lives to pull you out of that hole, you talked...You talked a lot." _

_He remembered Sam's expression, the look of disappointment and disdain in his eyes. He also remembered the fear and heart wrenching grief on Josef Broshev's face as Larry's knife plunged into his heart._

_Axe wanted him to report what had happened inside the farmhouse. He wanted him to turn on the man who had taught him every piece of tradecraft he knew; the man who had saved his life on countless occasions. Yes, Larry was impulsive, and Michael suspected he wasn't wholly sane. But it was an insane world they were operating in. Where, sometimes, doing something terrible was the right thing to do._

He felt a tearing sensation and pain shot through his scalp. Groaning, Michael forced his eyes open while attempting to bat away the fingers probing the sore and inflamed wound.

"Sorry, it's gotta be done," Sam Axe apologized as he continued to work at cleaning away the infection that still oozed from the laceration. "But we should make it to the safe zone later today and then you're just a chopper ride away from proper medical attention."

"Thank you." Michael winced, as a fresh dressing was applied to the back of his head.

"Yeah, well don't thank me yet. We've got to get through the Russian lines. They're all the way across a ten mile stretch supposedly running training exercises." He finished bandaging the dressing in place and then tidied everything away. "Think you can manage to eat something?"

"Yeah." At the mention of food his stomach clenched, as he tried to remember the last time he'd had something to eat.

"_Oh, cheer up, Kid. I ordered a champagne supper for when we get back and requested that those two pretty waitresses from last night serve it up."_

_That was something else he had picked up from Larry; an appreciation for the finer things of life. He went from Army rations, or even worse his mother's cooking, to staying in four and five star hotels; from fatigues to wearing made to measure designer suits and from visits to the company barber to visiting high end salons and getting expensive haircuts. _

"Hey, Westen! Mike, wake up!"

"What?" He looked around confused by Sam's concerned expression.

"Keep still."

Michael squinted and tried to look away from the light being shone into eyes. "What's the matter?"

"You drifted off there for a moment, buddy." Sam's tone was light, but Michael stared up and caught the worried frown that flickered briefly on the older man's face. "I think we'll pass on giving you something to eat." He glanced up through the hole in the roof. "It's nearly daybreak, we'll be moving off soon." He gave Michael a pat on the arm before getting to his feet. "Try to get some rest."

"Sam?" Michael called out as the older man turned away.

"What?"

"I know you _think_ you know what happened. But it was necessary. Sometimes there's no other way."

Sam stared down at his feet and then looked the injured spy in the eye. "Is that you talking or Larry's Kid?"

Michael opened his mouth to reply, but then thought better of it. What could he say that would make this right? Sam would never understand; he worked as part of a team. There was a structure of command and accountability. He couldn't know what it was like out in the field, where everybody lied; where an asset could turn on you in the blink of an eye and where the only thing that mattered was results.

"I'm tired, I think you're right. I need to rest." Shifting slightly, he closed his eyes. He was already beating himself up about what had happened. He didn't need to hear it from somebody else.

He heard a loud sigh and opened his eyes to find Sam squatting down at his side. "Mike, I was there with you Serbia." He kept his voice low. "I saw how the pair of you operate and I know you've pulled some difficult assignments since then. But I can't believe you think that the massacre of a whole family was necessary. _You have to say something._"

"You weren't there," Michael replied quietly.

"Yeah, well, listening to you rant and rave for six hours made me feel like I was there in that farmhouse with you. Sizemore is a lunatic. You won't be held responsible for his actions. Not if you step up."

"_Don't worry about it, Kid. I've got your back. The warhead's destroyed and nobody is gonna miss a rogue spetsnaz team. You were just a little over enthusiastic, that's all. I've already gone over that bitch Kopec's head. Stick with me and you'll be fine."_

Michael closed his eyes and looked away. "I can't. It's like I said before, you wouldn't understand." How could he rat out Larry when he owed him so much?

He lay still, waiting until he heard an annoyed huff and then the creak of rotten floorboards as Sam moved away. The sounds of the SEAL team getting ready to move out barely registered, as Michael worked at pushing the memories of what happened in the farmhouse into the deepest recesses of his mind.

"Ready to go, Westen?"

Michael looked up into the face of one of the SEAL team. He thought the man's name was Harlan.

"Yeah." His answer came out as little more than a whisper. He bit down on his lip as he was lifted up and they headed out of the abandoned building and into the thick early morning mist.

"You sure you're okay, Westen? You look like you're about to pass out."

"I'm fine."

Closing his eyes, Michael willed himself to fall asleep. These men were risking their lives to get him to safety. He wondered if they would be so willing if they knew what he had done. He pushed the thought further away. He had done nothing.

**()**

Michael woke up to the loud crackle of gunfire, lots of gunfire, some of it coming from close by. While he was still trying to work out what was happening, he suddenly crashed to the ground. Grunting in pain, Michael lay stunned for a moment. The pain radiating from his head wound dimmed his senses, leaving him confused and just briefly filled with fear. He was on a battlefield, wounded and vulnerable.

A bullet hit the ground close to his side, sending up a spray of dirt and grass. It was enough to cause his survival instincts to kick in. Reaching across his body, he pulled out the IV catheter from his arm. He needed to be able to move without dragging tubing and bags of medication around behind him. Then he raised his head just enough to look around.

One of the SEAL team was down, the arm of his fatigues coated in blood. The others were in a semi circle surrounding them, firing into the trees. "Can you move?" Sam glanced back before returning to keeping the hidden enemy back in the trees.

"Yes sir!" The injured SEAL called back, already raising his rifle one handed to aid his team mates firing on the elusive enemy.

"Westen?" Sam risked another quick look behind him.

"I think.." Michael attempted to stand but his legs gave way and the throbbing pain coming from his head wound increased as he tried to move. "No." He hated having to admit it, but now was not the time for lying about his weakness.

"Okay, folks let's get moving. Harlan, help Westen. The LZ is two miles away and transport is on the way."

Michael found himself unceremoniously thrown over Harlan's shoulder as the man carried him towards the landing zone. The wounded man kept at their side, holding his rifle awkwardly in one hand, ready to give covering fire if necessary. Behind them, Sam and the remaining SEALs formed up a rearguard keeping the advancing men at bay. Looking back, Michael caught sight of a Russian Army uniform. He knew if they didn't reach the LZ soon, they were going to be in a lot of trouble. The troops would have already called for back up; more soldiers would be flooding the area and possibly air support too. If the Russians called in their helicopters, the rescue mission would be aborted and they would have to continue to fight their way clear before trying to call for a med evac.

Michael watched as another of Sam's men took a bullet his body going limp as he fell back. The remaining SEALs closed ranks around the body. While one man picked up the unconscious man the others sent several grenades towards their pursuers. Overhead came the welcoming roar of the twin engines of a Blackhawk helicopter, the heavy rotor blades sending up clouds of dust and tearing leaves off the trees. The loud staccato drumbeat of it's guns clearing away the Russian troops long enough for it to touch down for the few seconds necessary to allow the SEAL team and Michael to board. Before rising back to the air and moving away at speed.

As the Blackhawk rose up into the air, Michael was strapped on to a stretcher. A medic quickly checked his vitals, before turning away to help with the two injured SEALs. Left on his own he stared up at the ceiling listening to the loud twin engines roar as they gained height; the fast moving blades propelling them out of danger. Pretty soon, he was going to be back on a US airbase and from what Sam had hinted at, there was going to be a whole lot of people wanting answers from him. Closing his eyes he realized he was going to have to make a decision on what he was going to say.

_"What we do saves lives, Kid. All Langley cares about is the end result. They don't want to know all the dirty little details."_

**()**

As soon as the Blackhawk touched down at Incirlik, medical teams rushed forward to carry away the wounded. Sam and the rest of the uninjured SEALs stayed out of the way until their team mates and the spy were safely on their way to the base hospital. Then they slowly made their way towards the armory to get rid of their weapons and onto the barracks for a shower and some well earned sleep.

"Lieutenant Commander Axe?"

Sam stopped in his tracks and turned to face a tall, pasty-faced young man dressed in fatigues that looked like they had just come off the shelf and wearing boots with only a thin layer of dust and not a single crease. This was some company office clerk. No, he revised his opinion when he noticed the kid's muscle tone. He was a rookie CIA field agent probably on his first assignment. Which meant he was about to be called into a meeting with whoever had been put in charge of the CIA investigation.

"Whatever it is it can wait," Sam growled and began to follow the rest of his men.

"Sir, I've been sent to get you." The young man followed him jogging to keep up. "I'm Agent Steven Benson. My boss wants to see you now."

"Your boss will have to wait. Tell him I said he needs to remember the chain of command. I report to a whole different ..."

"Sir, Station Chief Kopec told me not to take no for an answer." Steven almost ran into Sam as he came to an abrupt halt.

"Kopec? Rayna Kopec?"

"Yes, sir."

Sam dropped his chin and took a deep breath. "Fine, lead the way." It had been a couple of years since he had last seen Rayna Kopec, but he knew damn well if he ignored the polite request that she would come down to the barracks and drag him back to her office. It was better to give in gracefully.

He walked through the door Agent Steven Benson held open and looked at the woman standing behind her desk.

"Ok, I'm here. What's so damned important you can't wait until...?" He halted his words when he saw the look on her face.

Rayna stared back at him, her cobalt blue eyes narrowed in concentration, her mouth set in a thin tight line. She stared past his shoulder. "You can go, Steven."

She waited for the young agent to close the door to her office. "Sorry, Sam, but I needed to see you as soon as possible, _before_ the official debriefing."

Dropping his back pack and leaning his rifle against the wall, Sam slumped down in a chair in front of the desk. "Ok, Sandy, what's so important I can't have a shower and a sleep before being dragged in to see the CIA Station Chief?"

The nickname slipped out naturally. They had known each other for years as friends and as lovers. It was because of that history he could see the anger and frustration that was bubbling under the cool exterior.

She stepped from behind the desk to stand in front of him. "I need to know if Westen said anything about what happened out there."

No warm greeting, not even a smile of welcome. Things were definitely worse than he had suspected. "He was out of his mind for most of the time. He's got a nasty head injury. I -" What else could he say. He had no proof. He just had hope Mike Westen still had a conscience.

"Sam, I'm under lot of pressure to send in my report," she explained. "Questions are being asked at the UN. Russia has accused the US of interfering in another country's civil conflict, while Chechyna is accusing us of assassinating one of their government officials. Moscow expelled four of our diplomats last night and DC is expected to retaliate later today. There could be some serious blowback if this continues to get out of hand."

Rayna reached behind her and picked up a thin file. She held it up. "This is Larry Sizemore's debrief. He claims that they discovered Broshev was a Russian spy. _He_ expects me to believe he and Westen went out to the Broshev residence to talk. That loose cannon told me that Broshev tried to shoot them and after they had escaped, Broshev blew up his own house killing himself and his family."

Sam thought about what he had heard during Westen's delirium fuelled confession. Larry was going to weasel his way out of facing charges for cold blooded murder. "He went to _talk_? That doesn't sound like Larry."

Rayna paused and looked closer into Sam's brown eyes. She knew him very well and she knew he was hiding something. Throwing the file back onto the desk, she began to pace about the office. Sizemore was lying to her and now Sam was hiding something too.

"No, it doesn't. But the brass love him and I'm being pressured to accept his report as the official version. He says they left recording equipment at their hotel. I've had it picked up, but it's going to take at least a week to get verified and by then if I've signed off on his report and something else comes to light-" she paused to fix him with a stare, not letting him break eye contact. "Did Westen say anything?"

"He was out of his mind, most of the time." Sam replied, uneasy with the questioning and with the way she was looking at him.

"Look, I know there's more to Sizemore's story than he's telling me and whatever it is, I need to know what it is. It's my name that goes on that report and if something comes out later... I'm not letting that sonuvabitch ruin my career."

"Have you passed on your concerns?" Sam hoped to distract her from questioning him further on what Mike had said.

"When they pulled the assignment, I told my boss they were wrong for it. It was a damn fishing expedition. But there have been questions about Westen's state of mind. The white coats thought a simple fact finding mission might give him a break without taking him out of the field. As much as I _hate_ how the pair of them operate, they get the job done. If this thing does blow up between the Soviets and Chechyna, we're going to need people like those two on the ground."

Sam looked at Rayna and sighed. She deserved to know the truth. "Pour me a glass of some of that bourbon you've got in that drawer and I'll tell you what I heard."

She eyed him up and down. "I'm not your barmaid now, Lieutenant Commander Axe."

"You'll always be my barmaid, Sandy, and you know it." He managed to pull off a full blown Sam Axe charming smile.

She gave him a soft smile in return and went to the drawer he had indicated. Sam Axe always seemed to have a knack of knowing where the alcohol was kept. Pouring him a generous measure, she handed him the drink and then turned to perch on the edge of her desk facing him.

"So what do you know?" she asked, crossing her arms over her chest. She hadn't poured herself a drink. This was business. She took her job very seriously and she wasn't going to tarnish her reputation because of Larry Sizemore.

"It's all hearsay. Westen was out of his mind at the time and I can tell you now, Sizemore has set up a nest in his head."

"Spit it out, Sam," Rayna groused. She recognized the signs of Sam taking on a cause.

"Westen was raving about what sounded like a massacre." he finally spoke. After taking a big gulp of bourbon, he continued. "The way I understood it, Larry sent Mike out of the room and then he killed the whole family. He called Mike back in help him clear up the mess."

Rayna paled at the thought. She had suspected for some time that Sizemore was heading off the reservation but she hadn't dreamed that he had gone this far off.

"I'll talk to Westen once the doctors have finished with him and then I'll make a decision on what to do with the pair of them."

"There's no proof, Sandy. If Mike won't confess, what are you going to do?"

"Oh, there'll be something somewhere that I can nail to their hides. Between Westen's last psych report and what just happened, I'll threaten to have him burned. He'll break."

Sam leaned forward, placing the drink on the table. "Taking it out on the kid is not going to get rid of Larry and you know it. Westen deserves a break. I've worked with Larry, a coupla times. He's a force to be reckoned with. He just steamrollers right over you and he has the backing of the higher ups. How about after you've done your debrief, if he still won't fess up, you let me have a go at him."

"You think you can get him to talk?" she asked.

"We have a history. I knew him years ago, worked a couple of jobs with him back when he was a Ranger, then the job in Serbia. Look, even your own people have noticed a change in him. At least give him a chance."

Rayna looked across the room, lost in her own thoughts. Westen had been a good agent and his record as a Ranger had been exemplary, but he had changed over the last year. She had noted it in her reports. She was convinced he was becoming another Larry Sizemore. The Kiev job had brought Michael Westen to the fore. It was his name the FSB was whispering; the ghost who had taken out an entire Spetsnaz team and now this. They needed stopping before they brought the whole agency into disrepute.

"You go get your rest and I'll give you a call after I've spoken to him. It probably won't be until tomorrow. He's in surgery now."

Sam got to his feet and gently placed his hands on her shoulders. Leaning in, he placed a soft kiss on her forehead. "How about you let me have a shower and get a few hours rest and then I'll come back over and help you run through your debrief." His suggestion was very plain.

She pushed him away, wrinkling her nose. "Make sure you shower at least twice before coming back. You stink."

After Sam closed the door on his way out, Rayna went around the desk and sat down with a sigh. She pulled out Michael Westen's file and began to read. She was going to break Larry's Kid and then throw the pair of them out on their murderous asses.


	6. Chapter 6

**Savior.**

**A/N: Thank you everybody who has reviewed this story or put it on your alerts or favorites lists. And a special thank you to Jedi Skysinger for her beta work on this chapter.**

**Please remember this is a dark story set when Michael was working with Larry Sizemore. At a time when he was in dire need of a savior.**

**Part Six.**

"Contact the retrieval team. I want that hotel room torn apart and check the ETA on Westen."

With Kopec gone from his room, Larry lay back in his bed and closed his eyes while he set about analyzing what had just occurred. The Ice Queen had lost her temper and it had very nearly thrown him. She was angry about Broshev turning out to be a traitor and with them keeping her out of the loop. He suddenly smirked that had to be it; the little lady didn't like to be made to look foolish... Twice.

_Oh, she was going to be pissed with Michael. He needed to make sure he got into see the Kid before Kopec had a chance to get her claws into him. Make sure he had got his head screwed on straight. He had been acting a little off ever since he had finished his interrogation of Broshev. So first thing on the agenda was to find out where Michael was being held and then get into see him._

He was just trying to work out how he was going to achieve his objectives, when the door opened and a young nurse stepped into his room.

"Agent Sizemore? Is it alright if I change your dressings?"

He had noticed this particular nurse before and had already formed the opinion that she would make an ideal asset. She was young, inexperienced and, by the way she looked at him, had serious daddy issues.

"Well, hey, there sweetie pie and how are you today?" He revealed his teeth in a wide friendly smile.

"I'm fine, Agent Sizemore and how about you? Do you need anything?"

"Oh, all I need is for you to call me Larry," he peered at her name tag, "- Cheryl."

He noted her eager smile and the faint blush that colored her cheeks. _This is going to be so easy. _He amped up his smile a notch and watched her blush grow.

By the time the dressings were changed on his shoulder and hip, she had agreed to let him know when Agent Westen arrived on the base and to keep him informed on the other agent's condition. She even agreed to keep it their little secret.

"I can't tell you how much this means to me, Cheryl." He gently laid his hand on top of hers. "You're an angel." He nearly choked on the words, but they had the desired effect. She left promising to come back as soon as she knew anything.

"_Jeez, I just get better with age."_

With that, he finally let the feeling of exhaustion overtake him and went to sleep. He was confident the little nurse would be back as soon as she had the information he wanted and he was right. By the evening he knew that Michael had arrived with a SEAL team. He had been taken straight through to surgery with a badly infected head wound and possible blood poisoning. He also had several broken fingers and a couple of cracked ribs.

Digesting the news, Larry came to the conclusion that Kopec would wait until the anesthesia had worn off before attempting to question the Kid. He was busy planning his next move when he felt a soft hand on his wrist. He looked up just managing to mask his irritation.

"What is it, Sweetie?" _Why was she hanging around?_

"I'll see you later - Larry," She spoke in a breathy little voice that set his teeth on edge.

"Remember, you promised to get me into see Michael as soon as he is out of surgery. It's really important to me."

"B- but my shift..." Her words dried up as he stared at her, all this sweet talk was grating on his nerves. Behind his smile and hopeful expression, Larry was wondering if he could break her neck with his one good hand. He flexed his fingers as his eyes dropped to study her neck. _She was a skinny thing; yes, he could definitely kill her with one hand_.

"Larry, are you listening to me?"

He realized he was day dreaming. "Sorry," he gasped, shifting as if in pain. "My leg... What is it, honey?"

"I said I'll call back in a couple of hours when it's a bit quieter. I should be able to sneak you in to see him then." She paused at the door. "I won't get into trouble for this, will I?"

"No, it will be fine...Promise."

As the door swung shut the charming smile fell from Larry's face, replaced by a scowl. _God, lonely women were so damn easy... Show them a bit of attention and they were all over you...It was boring._

**()**

Michael felt the jolt as the helicopter landed, and the sensation of being transported rapidly out into the open and into a cool, well lit building. He was aware of all the hustle around him, the multitude of voices all becoming one confusing, disorientating noise. He struggled briefly against the hands, removing his clothing, pulling him about. But then he felt himself begin to slip away.

Then came the rancid scent of death and faintly Sam Axe's voice whispering in his ear.

_"Sizemore is a lunatic, you won't be held responsible for his actions. Not if you step up." _

_Held responsible? "I did nothing wrong." _

_The smell of the death and dying was getting stronger. He could hear pitifully whimpering voices and the soft noise of a silenced weapon being fired into flesh. One, two, three... He stopped counting._

_"You tell him, Kid. What we do saves lives. All Langley cares about is the end result. They don't want to know all the dirty little details." Larry looks down at his blood soaked shirt. "When we get back to civilization, we're going to need to take a trip the tailors. This was my last decent shirt."_

_Bodies were piling up before his eyes, some had had it coming, some were a case of being in the wrong place, mixing with the wrong people and some didn't deserve it at all. _

_A cream colored teddy bear lay on the kitchen floor. _

_"I can't believe you think that the massacre of a whole family was necessary. You have to say something." There was Sam again, the voice of reason._

"_Reason? Don't tell me you're listening to Axe? Remember Serbia, Kid. He's not like us. He'd never cut it in our world."_

_"You weren't there and you wouldn't understand. You work by a different code. What we do, me and Larry, is not the same as working in the teams."_

_Broshev was a traitor to his own people. He betrayed them. He was about to sell them both out to the FSK in return for a new life far away from Grozny. He deserved what he got._

_The children, he could hear them, see them, laughing playing outside chasing the chickens that ran loose in front of the house. The old woman sat on a chair shelling peas, her cackling laugh drawing his attention on the day they first visited the Broshev home. _

"_You shouldn't have killed the children, Lare."_

"_Maybe you're just not cut out for this. Maybe the recruiter got it wrong and you really are just a special ops drone incapable of thinking for yourself." Larry raised an eyebrow as he casually buried the hilt of his knife into Josef Broshev's chest._

_Humidity hit him like a wave, rolling over his body. A stifling wet heat and he was angry and frustrated and if he didn't adjust his attitude Captain Novack was going to put him on report._

"_If you're having trouble following orders, Mikey, why don't you go talk to that recruiter. He's been droolin' over you since that fire fight last week."_

"_I don't know, Sam. Me, a spook?"_

"_Why not talk to him? I think his name's Raines."_

"Agent Westen? Michael? Can you hear me? You're out of surgery. You're going to be fine."

A comforting hand was resting on his shoulder. "Lay still and just press this if you need assistance." His hand closed around a device, his thumb placed over the top.

"We'll take you to your room in a little while."

He blinked and tried to talk, but instead of words he coughed and groaned. Surgery, he was back.

_"The death of that man and his family has caused a lot of heat back home. You need to pull yourself together. There are a lot of people wanting answers about what happened in that house. You need to stop lying to yourself and stop protecting Larry Sizemore before he pulls you down with him."_

"_It's called wet work for a reason, Kid. Maybe you should just call the Den Mother and tell her you wanna go home to mommy." _

"_No! I showed you. I showed everybody. I choose who lives and who dies. Me!"_

_"There's nothing else like it, is there, Kid? Nothing really makes you feel quite as alive as when you're killing someone. Don't slip back now; the training wheels are off."_

_Six dead spetsnaz and it was all his own work. That had been a very good winter for him. Larry respected him, had sung his praises and he had felt the fear of the ordinary office drones when he walked into a room. _

_He was somebody to be feared and respected, an unstoppable sonuvabitch._

Pain, searing pain, shot through his head and his eyes flew open.

"Hey, Kid." He heard the words as if they were coming from a long way off.

"Hey, come on." More pain and the voice was louder, angrier. He could just make out a large shape looming over him.

"Dad?"

"No, Kid. C'mon, this is important."

"Larry?" Finally he could identify the face of his mentor beaming down at him.

"Nice of you to join me, Kid."

"L- Larry?" Michael groaned, he looked around in confusion. He was out of the post op ward and in what appeared to be a small side room.

"Yeah, Kid. Now, we only have a short time. You're in big trouble."

"Huh?" Michael was still trying to make sense of what had happened. How could he be in trouble?

"That bitch Kopec is heading the investigation into the mission _and she is pissed with you_."

"Huh?" Michael's eyes went in and out of focus. "Kopec - ?"

He started to remember, Chechnya came under her jurisdiction.

"Jeez, Kid, pull yourself together. She tried to get rid of you after Kiev, don't you remember?"

Kiev, oh he remembered Kiev. That was the night he showed them all. He showed Larry... The rush of pride fell away as he was suddenly assailed with images of the farmhouse.

"She - " She had slapped him down after Kiev; he remembered the fear of being thrown out into the cold.

"Damn it, concentrate!" Larry's slapped his hands down on the railing around the bed, he was losing his patience. "She's already taken my preliminary report, you've just got to remember things the same way _I_ did."

"Lare, you - we, killed..." The image of the bodies piled up on the floor, it could have been a scene from Bosnia, or Serbia. Only it wasn't.

"_Do you really think anybody is interested in the how we got the job done?_" Larry hissed angrily.

"No." He didn't have to think about the answer, all the things they had done, or he had seen done, not once had he been asked for an explanation... except by Rayna Kopec.

"That's right, Kid. They don't care about the details, only the results, but _you_ fouled up big time. _You _got caught. But we can work this out, put the blame where it really belongs."

Michael wearily wiped a hand over his eyes; he was having trouble staying awake. The images in his mind were mingling with reality. _The first time he saw a mass grave was in Bosnia, a whole community wiped out, except for a small group of women who spent what remained of their days wishing they were with the rest of their families. It took months to finally hunt down their target, after a week he had seen so many horrors he didn't think he would ever be shocked again._

"Michael, are you listening to me? You say the wrong thing and you'll be out. I won't be able to save your butt a second time. That whiny little traitor tried to get the drop on us, we fought our way out and then his house blew... Got it?"

"I didn't do anything." He was coming round more now. Larry's urgent tone was forcing him to concentrate.

"That's right you did nothing. It was the asset Broshev. He got the drop on us and after we escaped, he blew up his own house," he repeated his version of events again.

"But?"

"Don't you get it? It was _her_ asset who was the traitor; it was _her_ asset who blew the house. Neither of us did anything wrong. We were lucky to get out in one piece and get back to pass on the intel."

"Larry, civilians died you, we killed..."

Larry gave an impatient sigh. "What was the mission brief?"

Michael grimaced as the pain in his head worsened. "To find out which leaders in the Chechen forces would be most open to discussion and receiving support from our government."

"And what was the instructions regarding our presence?"

"Nobody was to know of our presence."

"So we did what we had to."

"They were children," Michael answered softly.

"Children who would have told the FSK that we spoke to their father, that we killed their father. You do understand that Broshev had to die? He was a traitor; he was going to get us killed. How many lives did we save by stopping him from betraying his own people?"

Michael was tired, still under the effects of the anesthesia and his head was hurting worse than before. He knew Larry wasn't going to drop it until he agreed. A little part of him thought Larry had a point.

"Kopec wants us both gone, you know that. She can't handle all the responsibility and she's trying to put the blame on us when she fouls up."

Michael didn't try to argue the point; instead he gave a slight nod wincing at the pain the movement caused.

"It was her asset. She's the one that told us to use Broshev."

"You said Broshev was your asset."

"Only because she gave him to me. If you look at it clearly, you'll see it's her fault." He grinned now a fatherly smile of encouragement. "I know you did the best you could, Kid. You didn't set out to get captured, but Kopec - I don't think she sees it that way. You don't need to distract from the bang up job we did by going into details. Broshev got what he deserved and he might as well have blown his own house up." He waited to see what effect his words would have.

"Okay," he whispered.

"I knew you would come around," Larry beamed. He glanced up at the clock on the wall. "Now my ride will be back in a few minutes. Let's go through what you're going to say to the Ice Queen while we wait."

**()()**

Leaving Rayna's office, Sam had made his way across the compound, glancing over at the hospital he wondered if there was any news about his men. Schafer's wound hadn't looked too serious, just a very bloody and messy flesh wound. But Cardoza, well, he had been hit hard. A bullet hit him just below the hem of the bulletproof vest; a nasty gut wound. The kid had been lucky that it happened only minutes before the chopper had arrived with a trained medical crew.

Sam paused as if to go towards the hospital, but then changed his mind. It was only an hour since they had reached the base. He doubted there would be any news yet.

Reaching the barracks, it took him only a few minutes to find his team's sleeping quarters. He wasn't surprised to find that the remaining members were sat up waiting for his return.

"Westen's commander wanted to know how her boy was doing," he told them. "You all should get some shut eye. I'm gonna have a shower and then head over the hospital."

As he was gathering up his wash kit and a clean set of fatigues, he heard a snigger and then Lance Farley who he had known since SEAL training asked a question. "The spook's commander wouldn't happen to be a dirty blond ex-SP hottie?"

Sam stopped for a moment before turning back to his men. "That's classified information, Lancer."

Walking away he could the other men asking Farley about a certain ex-Shore Patrol officer turned CIA Station Chief.

A few minutes later he was under a hot shower, washing away all the sweat and grime from forty eight hours in the wilderness. He really didn't envy Rayna the job of trying to keep Larry Sizemore under control. He wondered briefly if it might have been better for all concerned if he had just kept his mouth shut. He had got a strong impression that Mike Westen wasn't going to give up his partner that easily. Drying himself off, he got dressed in the freshly laundered fatigues and searched through his wash kit for his razor.

Maybe this was what Mike needed, somebody like a pissed off Rayna Kopec on his ass. He had seen her in action several times in the past. Larry's Kid wasn't going to stand a chance now she had him in her sights. He checked himself out in the mirror. _Maybe he would find the time for a little debriefing session after visiting the hospital. He had told her he would call back later._

Feeling a bit more human after a shower and shave, Sam found a table and chair and wrote out his report, trying to remember all the details of the extraction and the shooting of his team mates. By the end of it all, he was rubbing at his tired blood shot eyes. It was the part of the job he hated, all the reports at the end of any mission. A glance at his watch told him that enough time had passed that if all had gone well both men should be out of surgery.

The hospital was quiet, the corridors empty. The only sign of life was around the nurses' station. He stopped at the surgery ward inquiring after his men. As he stood chatting, he happened to glance along one of the corridors. His eyes narrowed as he watched a familiar shape in a wheelchair leaving a side room.

"Who's in the third room along on the right?" he asked pointing along the corridor. Before the nurse replied, he had already guessed.

"Westen, - oh, he came in with you didn't..."

She was left talking to his back as Sam strode down the corridor and entered the room just vacated by Larry Sizemore.

Michael Westen was laying on his side, his head covered by a thick dressing. He looked up at his latest visitor through tired eyes.

"Hey, Westen," Sam said as he entered the room. "How are you doing?"

"I'm tired," he answered flatly.

"Ah-huh, was that Larry I just saw being wheeled away?" He pulled a chair from the corner of the room, sitting down beside the spy's bed.

"Yeah. Look, Sam, I'm really tired and..." he let the sentence fade away hoping Sam would take the hint.

"That's okay, buddy. I was calling in to check on my two men who were shot getting you back here. One of them is gonna be fine, by the way. The other, well, I'm not so sure about the other one. Thank you for asking."

Michael blinked. "I meant to ask but..."

"But you're too busy learning the lines Larry just fed you...Am I right?"

Michael looked as guilty as hell. "He just came to see me, that's all."

Sam sighed. What he wanted to do was shake the younger man until he understood he was following the lead of a psychopath. But he also knew shouting at the kid would get him nowhere. When he had worked with him as a Ranger, the young Michael Westen brought a whole new meaning to the words stubborn and pigheaded.

So instead he settled for a bit of sarcasm. "Yeah, that's Larry, always looking out for everybody."

Michael closed his eyes. "I'm sorry about your men."

"But not about the murder of women and children?"

"That's unfair and it's also something you know nothing about."

He took a shaky deep breath. "I need to get some sleep, Sam. Can we continue this tomorrow?"

"Yeah, sure." Sam got to his feet, placing the chair back where it came from.

"Mike I know you're only listening to one person at the moment, but can you just think about if Larry gets away with what he's done this time, what's he going to ask you to cover up next?"

**()()**

Station Chief Rayna Kopec was still sat at her desk when she got word that Agent Westen was out of surgery and was expected to make a full recovery. She glanced at her wristwatch; it was after ten pm. She had been staring at the Michael Westen file for three hours and was no further along. There was one thought that kept playing in the back of her mind. _'Michael Westen had been a good agent.' _

She had worked several missions with the young agent before her promotion. She knew he was capable of being a real asset to the Company. He was smart, worked well under pressure, had a knack for foreign languages and, when he wanted to, he had an easy charm that made people open up to him.

But that had been before Larry Sizemore and before their mission in the middle of all the nastiness of the Bosnian War. Ever since their return from that deep cover mission, a subtle change had come over the young spy. There had been the complaints about his attitude to support staff and concerns about how he was spending his free time. She had to threaten to take him off active service if he didn't pull himself together to bring him back into line and she had thought the threat had worked- until Kiev.

Pushing the Michael Westen dossier across the desk, she leaned back in her chair. Screwing up her eyes, she pinched the bridge of her nose. Just thinking about Kiev was enough to bring on a migraine. It also focused her misgivings about the two men laying injured in the base hospital.

She had been overruled regarding Westen's future that time. Sizemore had gone over her head and used his popularity with the chiefs to save his protege's ass from being booted out, but not this time.

Getting to her feet she began to pace in front of her desk. Kiev had been a warning. They had gone off on their own, abandoning procedure that time as well. The first she had known of their activities was a call in the early hours of the morning informing her that two of her agents had taken possession of a stolen warhead belonging to the Russians and in the process they had killed six members of a rogue spetsnaz team. At least that time the dead had all been legitimate targets.

But if what Sam had told her was true, this time it was a lot worse. If Westen's delusional ramblings were to be believed, then Sizemore had executed a whole household, men women and children, every one of them a civilian, and then Westen had helped him destroy the evidence.

She came to a stop. There was no way she was going to sign off on their mission until she had the truth. This time Sizemore was not going to go over her head, calling in favors from the higher ups. She would keep them apart, isolating them until she broke Westen down.

"Steven!" She went to the door and smiled at the man still at his desk. "Put a call through to the hospital. When Westen is ready to leave post op have him put in a single room as far away from Sizemore as possible and then arrange for a guard to be put on their rooms."

As she finished speaking, she noticed Sam Axe standing in the doorway to the outer office.

"Sam," she smiled over at him, noticing he had followed her advice and was clean, groomed and dressed in fresh clothes. "Follow me," she beckoned him into her office.

Once inside, he closed the door and turned her to face him, staring at her with solemn eyes he gently cupped her shoulders.

"I heard what you said out there, but you're too late, Sandy. I went past Mikey's room and saw Larry being wheeled down the corridor."


	7. Chapter 7

**Savior.**

**A/N: _A Big Thank You to everybody who has reviewed, or put this story on alert or on their favorites list. I am sorry for the delay in updating this story, and I will do my best not to keep you waiting so long for the next one. To make up for my tardiness here is an extra long chapter. I also want to send out a huge thanks to Jedi Skysinger for her input and BETA of this mammoth chapter._**

**Warning: There is a very minor mention of child abuse (Mikey's home life). Also some parts refer to the Bosnian war, and war crimes. As I've stated before this is a dark story.  
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**Part Seven,**

Sam left Michael's room and headed straight for the CIA station chief's office. He was going to have to find a way of suggesting that if she wanted to get Mike Westen to 'fess up to what had happened in that Chechen farmhouse, she needed to tighten up her security measures.

He reached her outer office, his fingers closing around the handle when he heard her voice coming from inside.

"Steven! Put a call through to the hospital. When Westen is ready to leave post op, have him put in a single room as far away from Sizemore as possible and then arrange for a guard to be posted on their rooms."

Taking a deep breath he opened the door, stopping just inside the room. She looked across at him, her eyes flickering over his clean shaven features and freshly laundered fatigues.

With a welcoming smile on her lips, she beckoned him to follow her. "Commander Axe."

Once inside her office, he closed the door and turned her to face him. Staring at her with solemn eyes, he gently cupped her shoulders. It was time to break the bad news.

"I heard what you said out there, but you're too late, Sandy. I went past Mikey's room and saw Sizemore being wheeled along the corridor."

He watched her carefully as she stiffened before shrugging his hands off her shoulders and turning her back on him. "This is _exactly_ what I said would happen. If you're right about what occurred at the asset's home, then they've gone rogue. I'm going have to close them down before they end up killing more civilians and bring the whole agency into disrepute." She began to pace around the room, deep in thought.

Sam watched Rayna as she completed a circuit of her office. He knew if she was allowed to, she would keep going until she either came up with an answer or dropped from exhaustion. Taking the matter into his own hands, he caught hold of her around the waist and guided her to a chair.

"Sam, do I have to …." Anger flared in her eyes at his presumption.

He held up a hand to quell the words about to come from her mouth, while he pulled up another chair and sat down facing her.

"I know you're frustrated, but wearing a hole in the carpet isn't going to fix the problem, Sandy. You _know_ if you're going to break Larry's hold over Westen, you can't go in angry. Larry's like choke weed and he's got his tendrils wrapped tight around the Kid. I noticed it in Serbia and it's gotten a helluva lot worse now."

She shook her head in denial, but a vivid image flashed before her eyes of an angry young man standing at attention in front of her desk while she demanded an explanation for his recent behavior.

"Serbia was a year ago. Since then they've travelled into areas where they had no clearance, failed to keep their superiors informed of their actions and they have _both _committed unsanctioned kills. I think this last act proves they are completely out of control."

Sam stared back her- _both of them had committed unsanctioned kills._ He had heard all the rumors circulating; spies really were a bunch of bitchy little girls talking about each other behind the others back.

"I heard the buzz that you've been using 'Michael Westen' as a code word for a special ops team in Russia. Is that because what happened in Kiev? It's all they talk about around the water coolers at Langley, Mikey's lil tour of the old Soviet Union."

She raised an eyebrow, not terribly surprised about how far the story had spread.

"Westen took down a whole spetsnaz team on his own." She smiled at the only bright spot of that mission. "We knew he'd done it by himself because when the tac team arrived, Sizemore had taken such a beating that he couldn't walk without help."

Sam grinned wolfishly at the thought of a beaten and bloody Larry Sizemore. "How?"

"Whatever they were planning went wrong and Larry was taken prisoner. The Russians must have used him as a punch bag, presumably trying to get Westen to surrender."

"Oh, man, what I'd a given to see that," Sam chuckled. "I don't suppose you've still got the mission photographs handy?"

"Those pics are classified, Sam."

"Yeah, but they're in his file, right? I promise not to tell- Just a peek," he leaned back in his chair and winked.

"Sam, you're not helping me here," She smiled back at him though, grateful for the break in the tension.

"Really? Doesn't just the thought of Larry beaten to a pulp give you a nice warm feeling?"

"It does," she agreed, but then got back to business. "Larry Sizemore is as good as untouchable and he knows it. He has connections throughout the agency. The _only_ way I can get rid of him is if Westen blows the whistle on what happened outside Grozny and you've just told me that's not going to happen."

She was back on her feet again. "I've given that kid chance after chance, even when he didn't deserve it. Well, he can take the fall this time because this can't keep going on. They are out of control and, if he won't admit what happened, then I'm going to make damn sure he's burned and I'm going to make sure Larry doesn't get the chance to pull some strings this time."

"Hey, easy, Sandy baby, he's just a kid and Larry's got him all turned around. You didn't see him out in Serbia. Some of what he saw out there hit him hard and you didn't hear him yelling his head off about what went on in that farmhouse either. I tell ya what Larry did make him sick."

Sam was on his feet too, blocking her march around the room. "If you ask me you should get him out from under Larry's influence while he still has a soul- Cuz I tell ya, Mike Westen on the loose without a soul will be very scary thing."

The "Sandy baby" comment had very nearly earned Sam a punch to the jaw. She had had enough of that sort of patronizing talk from Larry Sizemore. She didn't like over familiarity, not even from somebody as close to her as Sam. But what he had said had given her hope for the young agent. If he had truly been sickened by what Larry had done...

"You know, it was right after they got back from Serbia that I started getting complaints about Westen, I should have come down hard on him then and split the pair up. He pulled a knife on Stanwyck." She saw the question in Sam's eyes. "That was my previous trainee. Westen had him pinned up against a wall."

She suddenly paled as another thought struck her; it was shortly after the altercation that Stanwyck had contracted food poisoning. She had put Westen on report and told him to clean up his act if he didn't want to be shipped back state side. A week later, Stanwyck had started to complain about feeling ill.

"_Larry loves using a blade, but he's pretty fond of his poisons, too." _

The warning had come from Larry's previous handler before she had gotten the privilege of trying to control him. Had Larry killed Stanwyck in reprisal for her pulling _his Kid_ into her office?

She sat down heavily, staring up at Sam with a determined expression. "Tell me about Serbia, not the official report. But what _actually_ happened there."

Sam took a deep breath and sat down facing her. "You read the reports?" he asked.

She stared back at him, _Had she read the reports?_ She didn't speak the words, she didn't have to.

"Okay, jeez." Sam read her expression correctly. He felt a bit like a school boy telling tales.

He thought about how much he should tell her. She wasn't going to want to know about how he made contact with the two spies, though that first meeting certainly showed him how much Mike had changed since the last time he had seen him.

_He had found the two spies waiting for him inside an abandoned cottage, Larry's eyes glinting at him through the darkness, Michael's hunched figure crouched by the empty fireplace looking like he was ready to pounce. It had only been when Larry had turned up the wick on an old oil lamp that he had noticed the blood and dirt ingrained into the clothes of two men; no, not just their clothes but into their skin and hair too. There had been an air about the pair of them of barely contained violence._

_Larry had insisted that they waited until the moon had risen high in the sky and all traces of daylight had vanished before leading the way towards General Drava's camp. Sam remembered how surprised and sickened he had been as they had climbed over the crest of a hill and he got his first sight and smell of what the other two men had been dealing with for the last few months._

_His senses had reeled at the stench coming from a pile of dead bodies near the entrance to the camp which appeared to have been left there to rot. Further into the camp they had passed by a drunken crowd cheering and jeering as the body of a man, hopefully dead, was dragged behind a motorbike and then there were the sobs and cries of the women..._ Sam closed his eyes not wanting to drag those memories back to the surface. He had been there for less than twenty four hours; Michael and Larry had lived in that camp for months before his arrival.

_He remembered how bile had risen in his throat and at one point the terrified scream of a woman had sent his hand straying to his weapon._ _Michael had leaned in close to him, stopping him from drawing the handgun._

"_Don't react, you can't help them. Not without blowing our cover,"_ _the younger man had hissed out the_ _warning before letting go of his arm and moving ahead to keep pace with his mentor. He had walked behind them wondering how the two men had coped with what they were seeing every day and not gone insane._

"Sam?"

"Yeah - sorry. You know what went on there, right? You must have _some_ idea of the things Mike must have witnessed. He was there for how long? Three or four months in hell, with Larry as his personal tour guide."

She nodded. "Yes, I have a good idea of what they faced and I saw first-hand how it had effected Westen. I tried to get him to accept a transfer to another region or, if he wanted to stay, to find him another agent to work with, but he refused to consider either offer."

She paused, remembering something that had concerned her at the time, something that hadn't rung true during their mission debriefing. At the time, her concerns had been swept under the rug by her section chief. Sizemore was an experienced agent and the two men were a successful team. "Stop looking for trouble" had been the final stark warning.

"Do you know what happened to Mitar Savic?" she stared as Sam paled. It confirmed her fears; Kiev wasn't the first time the two agents hadn't follow their orders.

"Sam, what happened? Their orders had been to locate and bring the arms dealer in for questioning, but they said he died during the extraction of General Drava."

"Oh yeah, he died alright," Sam snorted.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

_Pausing in the shadows, Larry pointed to a large tent. "Inside is the man we think is Drava. You ID him and then stay out of way while me and the Kid handle it."_

"_How are you going to do that?" he hissed. There had to be close to five hundred heavily armed men in the camp._

"_Leave it to us," Westen replied a little too eagerly for his liking._

"_C'mon," Larry urged him to move, leaving Michael behind. "In ten minutes, the Kid is going to set off a diversion and we're going to leave with the general."_

"_What about your mission? I thought you weren't to do anything..." _

_Larry laughed. "Two birds with one stone, Boy Scout. Let's just say our little arms thief is going to help us out with Drava."_

_Ten minutes later, there was a scream and a man came running seemingly out of nowhere with explosives strapped to his chest. Before anybody could help him, he disappeared in a massive fireball. _

_While the militia still was reeling from the surprise attack, more explosions went off adding to the chaos and confusion that was spreading rapidly throughout the camp._

"_See?" Larry slapped him on the back as he led the way inside the tent._

"Sam, answer the damn question!"

"Sorry." Sam wiped a hand over his eyes. "I believe they used Savic as a decoy to get Drava out of the camp."

Rayna dropped her head down. It was the news she was dreading.

"That tour I sent Westen on after Kiev- I was hoping that getting him away from Larry and talking about what happened on his own would make him see the mistakes they'd made, but I can see now it was too little, too late." She shook her head, in either disgust or defeat. "You know, he spent the first two weeks acting like a grounded teenager and then, just when I thought the Kid was coming around, I find out Sizemore had managed to organize regular radio communications between them."

Sam rubbed his eyes, a sudden feeling of tiredness coming over him. "Look, it's pretty obvious whatever is going on with Mike isn't going to go away while he's under Larry's thumb. Talk to him in the morning;. hell, put the fear of God in him if you think that will help. But if he still won't give up Larry, before you throw him out into the cold, let me take a run at him. Like I said before, I know him. Maybe I can get him to see sense."

She studied Sam's worn out expression, taking note of the slump to his shoulders.

"C'mon." Thinking about Larry Sizemore and Michael Westen had given her the start of a massive migraine. She got to her feet and offered him her hand to help him up. "You're right. We're just going round in circles here. Westen can wait 'til morning."

She eyed him up and down, noticing the way he was standing, taking more weight onto the right hand side of his body. "Your knee is acting up again." It wasn't a question.

"Coupla aspirin'll take care out the swelling," Sam answered.

"A massage will take care of the 'swelling' quicker," she smiled.

"A _massage, huh? _Hm, you sure want to make the swelling go away, Sandy? I mean - "

"Shut up, Sam."

**()**

Michael woke up when an orderly drew the curtains back from over the small window in his room. As he lay there, he noticed one of little touches that showed Station Chief Kopec had taken charge. Standing in the corner of his room, dressed in a plain black suit, was one of her team of junior agents, one of the Den Mother's guard dogs.

"Hey, I hope I haven't kept you up all night," Michael smiled at the man.

He waited, but got no response to his greeting; definitely a guard dog, Larry was right. The station chief was pissed. He bit his lip. A guard in his room meant she must have found out about Larry's late night visit. But how?

A sudden sinking feeling settled in his gut. _Sam Axe, the older man was interfering again._

Michael closed his eyes. Every time the SEAL and Larry came together it left him with a raging headache.

_They were in an old abandoned cottage close to the Serbian militia's camp where the suspected war criminal General Milan Drava was lording it over a nearly five hundred strong army. The room was dark and smelt of rotten wood and mold, the atmosphere frosty and full of suppressed violence. Michael was uneasy, his friend, colleague and mentor was angry. More specifically, Larry was angry and disappointed with him._

"_There was no need to call Kopec. What is it with you and her anyway? Do you still need your mommy to hold your hand?" A crafty glint had come into the older man's eyes and he chuckled. "Or maybe it's not your hand you want her to hold. Are you getting a thing for the Ice Queen, Kid?"_

"_Just following procedure, Lare," he answered from where he was crouching next to the ash and cinder filled fireplace._

"_You're not a rookie any more. You've moved up into the big leagues. You don't need the Den Mother's approval every time you wanna wipe your ass," he paused when they both heard the __crunch of a boot on the stony path outside._

"_Now you've got us stuck with a damn nurse maid."_

"_Nurse maid," "Trained ape," "Knuckle dragger," Larry spent his time waiting for darkness to come doing his best to get a rise out of the SEAL and prove his own superiority. _

"_Vampire," "Ghoul," "Sadistic sonuvabitch," The insults hadn't just gone one way._

_It had taken Michael less than ten minutes to realize he wasn't the only one who had a history with Sam Axe. _

_That had to be it. Sam was interfering- just like he had done before._

_Drava was tied up, gagged and had a hood over his head. The UN chopper was due to arrive in another five minutes. Larry was off acquiring their transport for the next part of their mission._

"_Mike, are you okay?"_

_He hadn't answered. He had known what was going through the other man's head._

"_Talk to your handler, Mikey. Larry isn't known as a team player. You might do better with somebody else."_

_He remembered how he had glared at his friend. "I don't want a new partner. I'm learning a lot from Larry."_

"_Yeah, he's taught you all about mass murder and how to help him cover it up," Sam's dry response came out of nowhere._

Yes, it had to be Sam, trying to do the right thing.

"_He's nothing more than a boy scout, Kid. Just remember who's got your back."_

He needed a distraction. The two men weren't even in the room and yet somehow they were battling away inside his head. Shutting off the part of his brain Larry and Sam were using as their personal combat zone, Michael turned his attention to the only distraction in the room.

"Do you get paid by the hour?" he threw out the comment, just to see if he could get any sort of rise out of the man. Nothing. Kopec's guard dog remained motionless.

_"Just remember what I told you. Stick with me, Kid, and I guarantee we'll get a commendation for neutralizing Broshev."_

It was all very well and good for Larry to make these promises, but it wasn't him that Station Chief Kopec was about to rake over the coals. Allowing his eyes to close, Michael did his best to convince the guard that he was unconcerned by his presence.

By mid-day and still no sign of Kopec, Michael's nerves were beginning to fray. She was deliberately keeping him waiting, trying to wear him down. Well, he'd learned a long time ago that it was a waste of time to fear the inevitable. To be precise it had been twenty years ago his dear old dad had taught him that fearing the inevitable was a waste of time.

_He hadn't meant to leave a burn mark on the dining room table. He had been trying to do a good thing. His ma had taken a licking the day before cuz she forgot to iron his dad's shirt. Well, that morning he had taken care of it. He had gotten up extra early and pulled a clean white shirt off the pile and set out to iron out the creases. He thought he was doing a real good job of it until the smell of something burning alerted him to the smoldering iron-shaped hole developing in the wooden table._

_The screech from the fire alarm had then alerted the rest of the family to his mistake. So he had done what any six year old would have done. He ran away._

_He had spent the whole day knowing and dreading what was going to happen when he eventually built up the nerve to return home. But when the sun went down, he knew he had no choice._

_It was that night he learned that the fear of the belt had been far worse than the actual sting from the length of leather. He knew from prior experience that the pain would pass; that the marks on his back, behind and legs would heal._

_He had just promised himself that one day he would be as big as his dad and one day he would give the old man a taste of what the rest of the family had to put up with._

When the door finally swung open and Station Chief Rayna Kopec stepped inside, he felt a wave of relief flow over him; the waiting was finally over.

He watched warily as she walked towards him, her back ramrod straight, her hair pulled back tightly. He guessed if she turned around he would see a thick braid of dirty blond hair lying between her shoulder blades. She stared down at him standing in an 'at ease' pose with her arms crossed over her chest, her cobalt eyes cool and flat.

Behind her, her latest trainee stood holding a clip board; the pup's eyes were firmly fixed on the paperwork in his hands.

"Agent Westen. I understand you've already had one visitor since surgery," she spoke in a clipped tone. "So I'm not going to bother to ask you about what happened in Josef Broshev's home. Instead I want you to explain to me why you fled in the face of the enemy leaving a wounded colleague behind."

"What?" Michael tried to sit up but the pain lancing through his head made him fall back gasping. He hadn't expected this.

"Did you or did you not leave Agent Sizemore after he was shot?" Rayna asked coldly.

"It wasn't..." He wanted to tell her that stopping hadn't been an option, but she was pressing on with her questions.

"I don't want excuses. Answer the question."

"Yes, but..."

She cut him off with a sharp movement of her hand.

"I'm not interested in your story, Westen. Do you admit to leaving Agent Sizemore to fend for himself after witnessing him take fire?"

"I was going to come back for him... I was unarmed... I - " He screwed up his eyes as the pain in his head intensified. She was making a case for burning him; he sure of it.

"You lost your weapon, abandoned your partner and then allowed yourself to be captured. Have I missed anything so far?"

"I - " Anger was beginning to build at the injustice of it all and he fought to keep control. The bitch wasn't even interested in his explanation.

"This is not looking good for you, Westen. Perhaps, we need to start with a full review of all your recent failures and deficiencies."

_You have to kill the Ice Queen with kindness, Kid. Once you lose your temper, she's won. You do not want to get your ass handed to you by some overachieving bitch, do ya?_

Michael took a couple of deep breaths, trying to curb his temper. She couldn't get to Larry. The older man had shown her up time and time again, so she was taking it out on him.

He watched as she picked up a chair from the corner of the room and sat down, crossing one leg over the other as she took the clipboard from her newest pup.

"Steven, you can leave us now."

Michael lifted his gaze to watch her pup leave the room and noticed for the first time that the guard dog had also left the room.

With her trainees out of the room, Rayna turned over the first page of the stack of paper attached to the clipboard.

"Let's review your performance record, shall we? Starting with Serbia and the reason why Mitar Savic, the arms dealer you were sent to investigate, couldn't be brought in for interrogation."

Michael paled. _Who the hell told her about that? _

The answer came to him almost immediately. Only one man apart from Larry and himself knew what had happened to that Serbian sonuvabitch: Sam Axe. He had to have been the one who told her about Larry coming to his room earlier and he must have also spilled his guts about all the little details they had left out of their report on the extraction of General Drava.

"_Dammit Sam, just leave me alone." _

"_As soon as you pull your head outta your ass, Mikey."_

"Agent Westen, I'm waiting for an answer."

"I - in the chaos of getting General Drava out of the camp, we lost Savic. But w- we had already interrogated him. We gave you the location of his warehouse. You ordered us to go to Belgrade and blow the weapons depot. The mission was a success. Everybody said so."

"A success? Is that what you called that mission? If you had brought Savic in, our interrogators might have got more information out of him."

"Yes, it _was_ a success and believe me when we were finished with Savic, he had nothing left to tell," Michael defended his actions.

_She hadn't been in Bosnia or Serbia. She hadn't witnessed the things they had seen. Men being __dragged behind cars until they died, bodies ripped apart_ - he stopped the thoughts, forcing himself to listen to Kopec had to say.

"At least that time you remembered to follow proper procedure, though your behavior afterwards left a lot to be desired. I still have all the reports: insubordination, rudeness to support staff and- ah yes- threatening another agent with a knife."

"I was reprimanded and cleaned up my act. You - "

"I accepted that you had been put under a lot of stress and I remember encouraging you to take some leave or to accept a transfer, which you refused."

"We were an effective team. Why would I give that up?"

Rayna hid a smile of triumph. _We_ _were_ an effective team. Not "_We are_." So he didn't think they were that effective any more. She pushed her advantage.

"Let's talk about Kiev."

"Rogue agents, selling a warhead to the highest bidder... I did the world a favor." He had proven himself to everybody that night.

"Rogue agents? Interesting choice of words, Westen; are you talking about the spetsnaz team or you and Sizemore?"

He didn't reply. In fact, he couldn't think of a single thing to say in response to her accusation.

"Failure to report that you had left your area of operation, failure to report you had found the location of the warhead," She ticked off each of their breaches of procedure. "Engaging in an elicit arms sale without clearance from your superiors and without back up. In fact, if it hadn't been for the quick actions of a tac team, you would have been in the hands of the FSK. Have I missed anything, Agent Westen?"

"No, Ma'am." He was shaking with the effort to remain calm.

"Oh, wait. There was also some collateral damage on that mission, wasn't there?"

Michael swallowed thickly, but made no other comment as he forced the gruesome images of the late Vasily Andropov, the arms dealer who'd been trying to buy the warhead, and his equally dead companions out of his head.

"I'm glad we're agreed that your behaviour has been questionable at best and downright reprehensible for the most part. Now, let's move on to what really happened in Grozny. Let's hear your version of events from when you arrived at the home of Josef Broshev."

She stared at his pale drawn features. She could see that she had rattled him, but as soon as he opened his mouth she knew she had lost.

"When we entered the farmhouse Broshev and his men took us by surprise."

She held up a hand, stopping his well rehearsed speech. "Three _civilians _were beyond your skills, Agent Westen? Haven't we just finished discussing a mission where _you _alone took apart a highly trained _six man_ spetsnaz team?"

He swallowed again, his mouth suddenly felt very dry.

She smiled graciously, noticing his discomfort, but she was far from done with Larry's Kid. "_Please,_ continue."

Michael's hand strayed to his head, gently probing the thick pad covering the large wound to the back of his skull. He knew what he had to do. He was an experienced operative. His cover was being questioned. An inexperienced agent would fold in the face of Station Chief Kopec's hard eyed gaze. But not him; he was no rookie Boy Scout fresh off the Farm. He knew when your cover was about to be blown, you played role even harder.

He straightened his shoulders and calmed his jumbled emotions before fixing his superior with a bright toothy smile straight out of the Larry Sizemore charm school manual.

"They caught us by surprise. We didn't want to start a bloodbath, so we waited for an opportunity to escape. When we got away, Broshev must have realized that he was going to be outed as a Russian sympathizer."

_The soft sound of a silenced handgun being fired on the other side of a thick wooden door, the smell of death, and the image of bodies piled high in the corner of a rustic kitchen._

"So, he rounded up his family and staff and then he blew up his own home using a high explosive?" She raised an eyebrow at the improbability of her statement.

"He must have thought he had no choice. I mean, the Chechens would have killed him if they had found out."

"Hmmm, it's always amazed me what some people will do when they think they have no choice."

She slipped her pen into the holder attached to the clipboard. "The civilian casualty rate just keeps going up when you two are around, doesn't it?"

"Ma'am?"

"Just an observation, Agent Westen." She got to her feet. "Now, I am going back to my office to go over my notes before writing up my final report. I suggest you think things over _very_ carefully before the official debrief."

"I don't have to think about it," he responded with false bravado.

She regarded him with a cold hard stare. "As soon as the medical team here gives you an all clear, I intend to call you in for a full performance review and psych evaluation. _This_ time Agent Sizemore will not be present to hold your hand."

"I haven't done anything-" His self assured act began to crumble, as realization set in.

_Don't worry about it. The Ice Queen is playing you. Stick with me Kid I can keep you safe, I tell ya we'll walk away with commendations at the very least. _

"That will be for the review board to decide."

She walked out of the door, leaving without another word.

Michael stared up at the ceiling, watching the lazy turn of the fanlight above his head. A sudden feeling of bile rising in his throat had him reaching for a bowl beside his bed.

_"If Larry gets away with what he's done this time, what's he going to ask you to cover up next?" _Sam Axe's warning rang clearly in his head, but Michael pushed it away.

Sinking back on his bed, he closed his eyes. "I did nothing, I wasn't there." He repeated the mantra as he fell into an exhausted sleep. "I did nothing, I wasn't there. I did nothing, I wasn't there. I did nothing, – ."

()

Outside Michael's room, Rayna spoke to the guard she had placed on the door. "Nobody goes in that room except medical personnel and when they go in, you go in too, _regardless _of what they say."

She had yet to find out the identity of the nurse who was assisting Sizemore, but when she did she was going to make sure that nurse was on the next plane state-side, where she could try her luck at finding another job.

Walking away with the clipboard clasped tightly in her hand and a stony expression on her face, she ran through the interview with Westen in her head. She had been sure he was going to crack at the end. She had forced him to remember every misdeed she knew about since his teaming up with Sizemore. She had hoped it would be enough, but obviously not.

Turning a corner, she ran into Sam Axe who had been visiting his injured team mates. "So how did it go?"

"I've rattled him. But what good it'll do, I don't know," she answered crisply. "If this doesn't work, Sam, I am going to throw him out on his rebel ass."

.


	8. Chapter 8

**Savior.**

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**A/N: Thank you for all the reviews for this story, and to those who have put it on your alerts or favorites lists. An extra big THANK YOU to Jedi Skysinger not only for her BETA work on this chapter but also for all her input in helping me write parts of this chapter.  
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_**Part Eight,**_

_**Larry Sizemore knew the first rule of interrogation as well as Rayna Kopec. **_

_**Isolate the subject, make them believe they are all alone, that their friends have abandoned them and that the only chance they have is to answer your questions.**_

_**He was determined to put a stop to her efforts to interrogate his Kid.**_

So while Station Chief Kopec was still sat in her office staring at the Michael Westen dossier and Lt Commander Sam Axe was occupied checking on the health of his two injured comrades, Larry Sizemore was busy making his way through the maze of hospital corridors with the help of his newly acquired asset, Nurse Cheryl Duggan.

He had one purpose in mind: to put a stop to Rayna Kopec interfering in his missions and his partnership with the Kid. All the woman had to do was sign off on his report. Instead she was using one insignificant blown mission to try to start a witch hunt against them.

He knew he had to get to Michael before the Station Chief did. He couldn't stop Kopec questioning the Kid, but he could make sure the young man knew he wasn't alone and that he still had a partner he could count on and also, most importantly, Larry needed to make sure Michael recited _his_ version of the events on the Grozny assignment.

**..**

"I know you did the best you could, Kid." Larry's words were laced with understanding; a senior agent explaining the best course of action to a more junior partner who had fouled up. "You didn't set out to get captured, but Kopec - I don't think she sees it that way. You don't need to distract from the bang up job we did by going into details. Broshev got what he deserved and he might as well have blown his own house up."

"Okay," Michael had eventually agreed.

"I knew you would come around," Larry soothed, happy that the Kid was finally seeing sense. He glanced up at the wall clock realizing he didn't have much time before the annoyingly attentive nurse he was using as an asset returned.

He kept on at Michael, drilling his version of events into the younger man's head, until there was a soft knock on the door and the insipid blonde nurse slid inside the room.

"Get some sleep, Kid. Just remember what I told ya," Larry muttered as he carefully lowered himself back into the wheelchair.

He got no response, Michael's eyes were already closed, his breathing steady.

"Larry, I'm sorry but we have to go. I'm off duty, if - " Nurse Cheryl Duggan, interrupted in a soft whisper.

"I can't tell ya how much this means to me, sweetie." Larry dazzled the young nurse with a toothy smile. His eyes twinkled with false sincerity as he gently stroked his fingers along her arm. "You know I thought he had died out there." He glanced over to the bed and the sleeping figure of his protégé.

"That's alright, Larry. You men are the real heroes; out there working on your own in the wilderness, trying to make the world a better place." She released the brake to the wheelchair before straightening up. "Let's get you back to your room, you look worn out."

Larry was already blocking out her irritating voice, his thoughts going elsewhere.

_What the hell was going on with the Kid? When had Michael Westen turned into such a whiny little girl? _

"_You shouldn't have killed the children, Lare."_

_Jeez, it's not like we're the goddamn Red Cross... What did the Kid expect? That we'd take a bunch of brats along with us back to Grozny? _

Larry dropped his head down, doing his best to ignore the mindless chatter of his soon-to-be-deceased asset as she pushed his wheelchair out of the room and into the hallway.

_The Kid had been full of righteous fire when they had heard Broshev selling them out to his Russian handler. The young man had stalked around the small hotel room almost breathing fire at the nerve of some minor government official thinking he could take them down. In fact, it had taken all his powers of persuasion to stop Michael driving straight out to the Broshev residence and putting a bullet through the traitor's head there and then. The younger man's wrath at the betrayal had really warmed his heart. But on the drive out Michael had become quiet, his whole attention fixed on checking his gun time and time again._

"_Hey, what's up with you?" he had asked._

"_I just want to get this over with Lare, that's all," Michael had replied as he continued to check over his weapon._

"_Yeah, well, put the gun away and cheer up... You'll get to use it soon enough."_

_Later on, the Kid seemed to be back to his old self. He took care of Broshev's lackeys without hesitation and had rounded up the traitor's servants without complaint._

_It was only when the Kid had spotted the whole Broshev brood lined up, waiting to help him encourage the whining traitorous bastard Josef Broshev into filling in the gaps on what intelligence he had passed onto his Russian masters, that he had spotted the hesitation in the Kid's eyes again._

_What the hell was Michael's problem with taking care of business when women and kids were involved? It was a weakness; one that_ _he was going to have to knock out of the younger man sooner rather than later. _

"Oh, Larry, that's one of the men who rescued your friend!"

Larry Sizemore looked up, a snarl on his face at having his train of thought interrupted.

"I - er -" Cheryl stuttered at the sudden look of fury twisting the handsome features of her new beau. She pointed down the corridor.

"That man walking towards us, he led the team that rescued your friend."

Larry eyes followed where she pointed and he was instantly on high alert. If he had been armed, Sam Axe would have been a dead man.

"Get me out of here. Now!" he snapped. He was _not_ going to face the SEAL at a disadvantage.

"But he rescued your friend," Cheryl informed him again.

"Be a good girl, sweetie; keep your mouth shut and just do as I tell you."

He didn't even acknowledge her huff or the sudden increase in speed of his wheelchair along the corridor. His mind was too busy whirring through the possibilities of this new bit of Intel.

_Lieutenant Commander Sam Axe, Boy Scout, and god damned pain in the ass do-gooder. If he was the one who rescued the Kid that explained where the annoying 'Saint Michael' attitude came from._

"Oww!" Larry glared at the bitch of a nurse who had just smacked his toes into the door on the way into his room.

"We're here," she sulked.

"Aww, honey pie," Larry smiled up at her; the scowl and anger gone in an instance. "I'm so sorry. I'm just tired and worried about my friend." He patted her hand, resisting the urge to break it.

"That's alright, Larry. You must be exhausted." She suddenly brightened. "Why don't I go make you a nice cup of hot chocolate?"

His jaw clenched and his teeth ground against each other as he struggled to maintain his calm.

_Some people just asked to be strangled, cut up into …..._ He brought himself back under control.

"No, thank you, I really just need to get back in bed."

"If you're sure," she said as she pulled back the covers and positioned the wheelchair so he could transfer himself onto the bed. "I mean, I could keep you company, or - "

As Larry sat on the edge of the bed, another thought struck. _It would be just like that damn Boy Scout to __report his late night visit. He was going to have to act quickly. Once Kopec found out he had gotten to the Kid first, she would be out for blood. _

Then he chuckled. _He was so glad the poison he had slipped into what he had thought was her cup of coffee had been drunk by her now deceased assistant Agent Stanwyck. Putting Kopec in her place was a game he never tired of playing._

Taking his mind off of Rayna Kopec momentarily, he turned his attention back to the young nurse who was carefully removing his slippers, her hands massaging his ankles and feet. She really wasn't his type. He preferred his women to be a bit more worldly wise; preferably a career-minded agency type who understood how the game was played. Each knowing they could take what they wanted from the other and in the morning walk away with no hard feelings.

He knew the little blonde's type all too well. She was so easy to manipulate, it was boring. She wanted the excitement of dating a mysterious, dark and dangerous man. In fact, he was certain the only reason she had joined the military and had become a nurse was so she could find herself some brave wounded soldier or airman to smother.

He noticed she was smiling up at him and he returned the look, cupping her chin gently in his hand. "Hey, babe, how about you get me a phone? I need to make a call."

For the first time, she looked a little nervous. Dipping her head down, she got to her feet and straightened up her uniform. "They took the phone out. I'm not sure... Ow!"

The yelp came as Larry's hand closed around her wrist lightening fast in a grip akin to that of a predator catching hold of its prey. "Sweetheart, I need to make an urgent call. It could be a matter of life or death."

"But, - " Nurse Cheryl winced, clutching at Larry's fingers, which were digging into the soft flesh of her arm.

"C'mon, it's just a phone call." He let go of her wrist, a look of remorse flickering briefly across his features. "But it's _very_ important to me. _Please_, baby," he cajoled.

"I'll see what I can do," she answered softly, backing away from him while holding onto her bruised wrist.

"That's my girl," Larry beamed. "Don't be long."

He lay back on the bed, easing his injured leg into a comfortable position. There was a seven hour time difference between Turkey and DC. The clock on the wall told him it was nearly midnight, which meant it was still the middle of the day back in the States. Plenty of time to ensure that Station Chief Kopec got a sharp reminder of her place when it came to how he handled his missions.

"Here," Nurse Cheryl came back into the room, pushing a small trolley with a phone sitting in the middle of the tray. Plugging the cord into a wall socket near the bed, she gave him the handset.

"Thank you, sweetie. Now, why don't you run along and get me something for my pain while I make my call?" he dismissed her with barely a glance.

"Larry, I - I think you owe me an apology."

She was trying to be strong, but Larry could see she was trembling.

His eyes narrowed. _An apology for what? Ahh.._ Realization came to him in an instant and he altered his features to show his remorse.

"You're right, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have grabbed you like that, but in my business- well this call is _very_ important," he emphasized again, taking her hand into his and lifting it to his lips to place a soft kiss to the back of her hand. "I'm very grateful, you know."

She relaxed and he could tell all was forgiven. He waited until she left the room and then dialled a number he knew by heart. When she returned five minutes later, the handset was back in its cradle and Larry was wearing a satisfied smirk.

Nurse Cheryl handed him two small pills and a glass of water. "Here and, Larry,- you do care about me, right? I mean, you're not just using me?"

"Using you? What makes you think that, sweetie?"

"It's nothing," she sighed. "It's just - well, you never use my - oh, never mind." She watched him take the pills and then took the glass off him.

"Don't worry about a thing, sweetie pie. Now let me get some sleep, huh, an' I'll see you in the morning."

He waited until she left his room and her footsteps faded away down the hall before opening his hand and studying the two little yellow pills lying in his palm.

Grunting from the effort, he picked up his slippers up off the floor and carefully eased open a small hole in the stitching he had made earlier. Sliding the pills inside with two others he had already hidden in the hole, he dropped the slippers back onto the floor. He thought another couple would be enough to give his annoying little asset a nasty heart attack when the time was right.

**()**

The single squeak of a rubber shoe sole on the cheap linoleum flooring was enough to bring Larry from being sound asleep to fully alert. Instantly he knew he wasn't alone. Turning his head towards the door, he stared straight at a tall burly young man dressed in a plain black suit and a white shirt.

_So the bitch had sent one of her dogs to watch him. Axe must have run straight to the Den Mother and this was her response to his late night excursion. Well, she was too late; he just wished he could see her face when she found out._

Using the controls, Larry pressed the button that raised the head of the bed so he could sit up. He studied the guard dog. This one had some field experience or maybe just an interesting past. He had a long scar running across his cheek and disappearing into his close cropped hair just above his ear. The wound looked recent and probably had put a temporary stop to a career in covert ops reducing him to guard duties.

"Good morning, Son," Larry grinned at the man. "You gotta name?"

As expected, he got no reply.

"You keep up that attitude, sonny, and I won't let you order any breakfast," he smirked as the man continued to ignore him.

Larry didn't know that Station Chief Kopec was at this moment preparing herself to grill his protégé to within an inch of his life. But even if he had known, it wouldn't have mattered. He had already ensured the conversation would go precisely the way he wanted. He didn't have a single doubt that his Kid would do anything other than exactly what he'd told him to.

It was several boring hours later that Larry was taken from his room for a MRI scan. The doctor had explained that an earlier x-ray had proven that all the bullet fragments had been successfully removed from his wounds, but now they wanted to check for any other damage that might have been caused.

Somehow his little nurse accomplice had managed to get the job of taking him to the MRI suite. She waited while he lay letting the machine whir, bang and crash about him and then had helped him back into the wheelchair. She fussed about, making sure his feet were safely on the rests and then leaned over to tuck a blanket around him.

"Leave it. I'm fine," he grumbled. He was fairly certain she had used up her usefulness.

"I thought I'd take the long way back to your room," she announced, pushing the chair out of the room and into the hallway. "It'll give us some time to talk. I wanted …."

He shut out her words, turning his thoughts to how he was going to get her to take the six tiny little pills he had stashed in his slipper. The MRI procedure, along with her incessant over-attentiveness, was beginning to give him a severe headache.

Suddenly, all thoughts of poisoning cleared away as they had rounded a corner and Larry found himself face to face with the duo who had managed to make themselves a serious pain in his backside of late. Sam Axe and Rayna Kopec stood directly in his path and there was no tactical retreat possible.

For a moment, they just stared at each other. Then Larry's eyes narrowed.

If he couldn't retreat, he'd opt for a full frontal assault. _The best defense is a good offense and I can be pretty damned offensive._

He continued to smile broadly, directing the full weight of his insincere charms at the duo who warily stared back at him. He noted Kopec held a clipboard clutched tightly in her right hand, at the same moment he realized they were just a few doors away from _his _Kid's room.

"Well, well, if it isn't the Boy Scout and the Den Mother. Don't you two make a nice couple? How was the meeting?"

He could tell by her posture alone that Michael must have stuck to the script. His self satisfied grin nearly split his face in two.

The look that passed between the two of them in response to the jibe and the way they moved slightly further apart set something off in Larry's finely tuned perception. There was more to Rayna Kopec and Sam Axe than just colleagues in arms.

_In arms, huh? _

He had a momentary memory flash, a little snippet he'd picked up ages ago when he'd gone through her records after having been assigned Kopec as superior and forgotten about until now. Axe's name had been on her naval recruitment papers as an emergency contact. His broad insincere smile slowly changed into a knowing leer.

She had been leaning in towards Axe, just a small shift in her body language easily over-looked, but taken together with the way Axe's hand had been drifting towards the Station Chief's waist.

"Hmm, maybe _meeting_ isn't the right word. You should be careful, Axe. You'll end up getting frostbite in places you won't want to have to explain if you spend time trying to warm up the Ice Queen."

"_Larry,"_ Sam growled low in warning.

"Oh, I think I hit a nerve," he chuckled. _This was better than he could have hoped for_. "I bet that's not all that gets hit when you two get together." He turned his gaze towards Rayna, his eyes racking up and down her body. "You know, honey, I've always had you figured for the whips and black leather type behind closed doors."

"That's enough!" Sam snapped back angrily. Taking a step forward, he grabbed a handful of Larry's hospital gown while Nurse Cheryl gasped and took an involuntary step backwards. The SEAL had fire in his eyes, his mouth twisted in a snarl.

"Sam," Rayna cautioned. Although she was accustomed to Larry's insults, this was farther than he had ever dared go before. Just another indicator of how far out of control the two of them had become. Still, starting a fist fight in the hospital was only going to play straight into Larry's hands.

"Go for it, swabbie," Larry challenged. "Of course, I'm sure there's something in your_ trained seal_ code of honor that says we're both supposed to be standing _before_ you start swinging."

Sam released his hold and stepped back. "Count on it. The next time I see you standing, I'm going to put you on your murderous ass."

"Agent Sizemore," Rayna began, moving smoothly past Sam, her eyes locked on Larry. "I think I need to speak to your physician regarding your medication or is this latest outburst your way of requesting a full profile review?"

Nurse Cheryl Duggan then made the mistake of letting her hand drift to Larry's shoulder, subconsciously sneaking comfort from the aggressively charged atmosphere surrounding the three people before her.

Rayna picked up on the movement instantly, turning her full attention on the other woman.

The young nurse gulped as hard cobalt blue eyes stared back at her before fixing on the way her hand was resting on her patient's shoulder.

"You'll need to come by my office, along with your supervisor, when you get done escorting Agent Sizemore back to his room," Ms. Kopec informed her coldly.

Larry couldn't have been happier. This was just getting better and better. _Let the Ice Queen make herself useful and get Nurse what'shername out of my hair. _He relaxed back in the wheelchair, directing his gaze towards Sam.

"If the Kid ever needs a wet nurse again, I'll call you, Axe." Watching the SEAL stiffen in anger, Larry deliberately turned his mocking gaze back to his chief. "I don't think you'd qualify, my dear. Oh, and you might want to check your messages, sweetheart, before you decide to have another conversation with _my partner_."

Sam and Rayna exchanged glances without looking directly at one another, a skill developed from their time together in the Navy. But Mr. Sizemore caught it nonetheless.

"Run along now, Mr. and Mrs. Cleaver, there's nothing wrong with the Beaver," Larry dismissed them as Nurse Cheryl started to slowly reverse down the hall with the wheelchair. "Nothing you two need to concern yourselves with anyway," he smirked, as the chair was spun round and he was hurried away.

Sam and Rayna silently watched as Nurse Cheryl Duggan spun the wheelchair about and pushed it rapidly along the hall towards Larry's room.

"Well, Larry's certainly feeling better," Sam remarked at length. "Must be all that bathing in the blood of children that does it for him."

"Really, Sam? That's all you've got to say? Something is seriously wrong if he's feeling brave enough to openly antagonize the both of us that way."

"Ooh, I'm far from happy, Sandy. I'll go push the sick sonuvabitch under a truck if it will make you feel better."

She shook her head, as tempting as the offer was she knew it wouldn't end the mess Larry had created.

"I think you should go and prepare for that meeting with your commander." She glanced at her watch. "It's set for seventeen hundred, isn't it?"

"Yeah, it's not that late already, is it?" Sam rubbed at his chin, his eyes still fixed on the direction Larry had been pushed away by the wide eyed nurse.

"No, but you need to go for a walk and calm down a bit before the debrief and I need to go-"

Larry's comment about checking her messages suddenly rang in her head and she knew in an instant what had happened. "Damn! That nurse must have gotten a phone to him. _She is done!_" she ground out between clenched teeth, her jaw set and her blue eyes blazing.

"Hey, hey, go easy on her, Sandy. It's like I told you before, Larry's a force to be reckoned with and that girl has to be crazy because she looked positively love struck."

"Well, her little love affair just ended her career," she replied flatly. "Come see me before you go to turn the screws on Westen."

**()**

Two hours later, Rayna Kopec was pacing her office floor, her fingers tightly pinching the bridge of her nose. She had been right that sonuvabitch had managed to get a call out, and as if Larry's contact knew her movements he had been waiting on the line when she had walked back into her office. It was the same smarmy voiced politician with the slow southern drawl that had contacted her after Kiev.

_Why hadn't she handed in the mission reports on Sizemore's Grozny assignment? Didn't she realize the political implications of her dilly-dallying? Had she thought about how it looked to their new Chechen allies that she was delaying closure on the case? _

Then the veiled threats had come_: Did she like her job? Maybe the promotion had come too soon? Was she admitting that she had lost control her assets? Her agents? The entire situation? _

And finally the part of the conversation that had made her want to hurl the phone across the room.

_If she was serious about her career and she ever wanted another promotion, she had better learn how to look at the big picture. Sizemore and Westen were a successful team. They had done a good job exposing Josef Broshev. Did she need reminding that the Agency was supposed to reward good work? He was expecting her written request for commendations for both of her agents by the following morning._

When the call ended, she had carefully placed the handset back on its cradle and slumped back in her chair.

_The sorry bastard had done it again._


	9. Chapter 9

**SAVIOR.**

**A/N: Thank you all as always for your reviews. Also thanks to Amanda Hawthorn and Daisyday for reading through parts of this chapter and Jedi Skysinger for her Beta of this chapter and for her help developing the OC JB Jamieson.  
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_**Part Nine,**_

_"Oh, and you might want to check your messages, sweetheart, before you decide to have another conversation with my partner."_

_._

A vision of Larry Sizemore's smug smiling face danced before Ranya Kopec's eyes as she paced back and forth wearing a hole in the linoleum covering the floor of her temporary office at Incirlik Airbase. Not only had Sizemore blind-sided her for a second time in less than a year, he had done it in such a way that her hands were now completely tied.

Two hours after one of the most unpleasant conversations she'd had to endure in quite a while, she was no further along in finding a solution to her 'Larry problem.' Eventually she slumped down in her chair, her elbows resting on the desktop, her hands on either side of her head. She could still hear that slow southern drawl, that sickly sweet tone coming through the phone line.

_"Ms Kopec, ah'm so pleased to get a hold of you. Ah do confess ah'm a lil perturbed about the delay in your releasing that final report on Agent Sizemore's Grozny assignment. Are you aware, my dear, of the political implications of your dilly-dallying? Ah'm sure it was just a lil ole __oversight on your part, darlin', although ah' have always wondered if perhaps such a prestigious position as the South-eastern region of Russia could've_ _been too much responsibility fer a wo - fer somebody only on their second posting as a station chief."_

She had picked up on his near slip. The good Senator was a renowned womanizer who made Larry Sizemore sound like an advocate for women's rights. She had only met him face to face once and that had been enough. He had held her hand a little too long and throughout the meeting had addressed her as 'darling' and 'my dear' and, worse yet, 'a sweet lil woman'.

_"Ah have to ask, my dear, are you serious about your career? It do seem like ah've had to remind you to look at the big picture before. Agents Sizemore and Westen are a bang-up team. You should be grateful to have those boys working fer you. Ah don' see why you persist in working agin' them."_

Grateful? Grateful for having to find a way of controlling a pair of agents who were apparently covert homicidial maniacs? She studied the folder laying before her, flipping open the thin cardboard cover of Larry Sizemore's mission debrief. She stared at the typed written words covering the page. This was what she was expected to sign off on? Slamming the folder closed, she pushed it away from herself in disgust.

That work of fiction was only part of the problem and the other part - - she couldn't even bring herself to ask Benson to pull out the necessary paperwork.

_"Those boys did a mighty fine job out there in horrendous conditions. You should be overjoyed to have such fine specimens of American manhood under your ah- command?" The chuckle was loaded with vile implications. "Ah shouldn't need to be a'telling you how the Agency needs to reward good work. Ah tell you whud, you be a sweet lil woman and just type out all those lil ole forms you need to, darlin' an' ah'll be sure to rush out a coupla commendations for them boys. How does that sound, my dear? It'll let those brave boys know just how much us folks back home 'ppreciate their sacrifices."_

That final part of the conversation had made her want to hurl the phone across the room. Instead she had gritted her teeth and promised to look up that 'missing' report and make sure it reached his office in DC at the earliest opportunity.

Dragging the folder back in front of her, she opened it again. Taking a deep breath to prepare herself, she began to read Larry's version of events as dictated to Agent Benson. She was half way down the second page when she was interrupted by a knock on her door.

"Enter," she called out, closing the folder.

Sam Axe paused in the doorway, his brown eyes registering concern when he noted the stress lines on her face.

"Problems?" he queried.

"You have _no_ idea. Come in and shut the door," she answered softly, her voice flat and the look in her eyes not particularly friendly.

By the time Sam turned back around from shutting the door, Rayna was on her feet, her mouth set in a hard thin line and her arms crossed over her chest.

"It seems Sizemore was very busy last night. Not only did he manage to get in to see Westen and make sure his Kid learned all his lines, he also found time to get a call out to DC. I've just had a very interesting conversation with Senator J.B Jamieson."

Sam winced. "As in the man in charge of the - ?"

"Senate Select Committee on Intelligence," she finished his sentence. "And he wants- no, he has as good as ordered me to close down the investigation on what happened in Grozny."

"Jeez," Sam whistled through his teeth.

"Oh, you haven't heard the best part yet." Her usual calm, controlled demeanor was slipping away before his eyes. "That pair of murderous bastards are to be _rewarded_ for their actions. They're supposed to be awarded _commendations_ and _I_ have to put my name on that recommendation."

"What the hell?" Sam snapped in disbelief, his eyes following her figure as she moved from behind the desk to pace about the room.

"'pparently it'll let those brave boys know just how much the folks back home 'ppreciate their sacrifices," she did a passable impersonation of the Senator.

"Ouch!" Sam winced, taking a step back as she shot him a look filled with venom.

"This is partially your fault, you and your _'go easy on the kid'_. I should have come down hard on Westen as soon as he regained consciousness and burned him right then. I had everything I needed," she shook her head in disgust. "But now? Once Jamieson approves those commendations, my hands will be tied."

She came to a stop in front of him, pointing to the folder still laying on the desk. "I can delay sending out that work of fiction for maybe twenty four hours at best. In the meantime," she stabbed him in the centre of his broad chest with a rigid finger. "I want you get to work on Westen. I want you to make it absolutely clear that I'm done with him and that I've got all the paper work ready to be sent over to Langley. Make him believe he has just one chance to tell me the whole truth about what happened on that mission."

Sam sucked in a deep breath as he realized her plan. "Rayna, don't - "

"Sam," she stared back at him, her expression deadly serious. "I _have_ to stop them and it's not like I have the luxury of time any more. Once Jamieson approves those commendations any hope I had of burning Westen will be gone." She leaned back against the desk. "I'm sorry. I know you like the kid. There was a time I had high hopes for him. Before he was partnered with Sizemore, he showed a lot of promise. I wouldn't have asked for him to be put on my team in the Balkans if I didn't think he was going to be a good agent and a valuable asset to the Company."

Rayna held up a hand as Sam was already shaking his head negatively. "Look, you've seen it for yourself. With Westen at his side Sizemore is getting more and more brazen and out of control. I can't touch Larry, but I can and I will take out his Kid if that's what it takes to stop this, even if it costs me _my job._"

"Don't do this, Sandy. You know it's wrong. Railroading the kid, it's a low trick." Sam closed the gap between them, gently cupping her shoulders and staring into her eyes. "Why can't you send him state-side? That head injury would be a legitimate reason to break up their team while he recovers. I know he has some sort of twisted loyalty to that ghoul Sizemore, but I'm tellin' you he isn't a monster, at least not yet. Give him some time and some room to think things through and he'll come round."

She shook her head, a look of determination on her face. "I've already given that kid more chances than he deserved. I tried after Serbia and again after Kiev. I've offered to give him leave, to transfer him to another region or find him another partner. He turned me down every time. No, he's gone too far this time."

Before Sam could speak again, the telephone on Rayna's desk began to ring. She held up an index finger before reaching across and picking up the handset.

"Ask them to wait. I'll be finished here in a minute," she placed the handset back on the desk.

"Major O' Reilly and Larry's latest conquest are waiting in the other room. I have to deal with that young lady now. Go speak to Westen," she paused, reading the indecision in his eyes. "Look, you'll be doing him a favor. If he keeps on working with Larry, you said it yourself he'll become a monster. This way he's out and he's young enough to start again."

"He's young enough to learn from his mistakes, too," Sam countered and moved away. "Okay, okay, I'll speak to him. But just give it a bit more thought, please."

Sam left Rayna's office, nodding to Benson who was still sat at his desk before glancing over to where a stony faced dark haired woman dressed in a fatigues which displayed the rank of a major sat next to Larry's blond haired nurse. The younger woman glared up at him, her face set in a scowl.

Leaving the office, Sam felt a small amount of pity for the young impressionable nurse. Rayna Kopec was definitely out for the blood of the person who let Larry Sizemore get his hands on a phone.

As he walked along the maze of corridors, Sam tried to work out the best strategy for getting Mike Westen's cooperation. He knew without a doubt trying to trick the younger man into revealing what had happened inside Broshev's farmhouse would not work. Besides, he always preferred the straight forward approach.

()

Exhausted after his less than friendly conversation with Station Chief Kopec, Michael had fallen into a deep sleep. So deep that he barely stirred when a nurse came in to clean and re-dress his head wound and replace the IV bags filled with saline, antibiotics and pain relief medication. Outwardly he looked at peace, but looks were deceiving. Inside, his fragile moral centre was taking a beating from all sides.

_"If Larry gets away with what he's done this time, what's he going to ask you to cover up next?" Sam Axe's voice echoed through Michael's head._

_"You won't be held responsible for what he did, if you step up, Mike. It's the right thing to do." So calm, so reasonable, sounding so disgusted that he was having to explain something that any decent human being would know without having to be told._

_But Sam didn't understand, how could he? He didn't know about all bodies all ready stacked up behind him. There was so many, too many to count. There were the ones that had deserved it. Others who were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time and then there was those who should have run away screaming as soon as he and Larry had come into view. He had lost count. Was it wrong that he had stopped counting?_

_What else could Larry ask him to do that he hadn't done already?_

_Destroy a man's reputation, ruin another's life? Done and done. Manipulate, threaten, blackmail an asset? Not a problem. Interrogate, torture? If it gets the job done. Kill? If that's the order. To stop other deaths. For the mission to succeed. If they're in my way._

_The children, Lare, why'd ya kill the …..? If he could just find a way of blocking out the sight of the ….._

_"What did ya want to do with 'em Kid? Take 'em with us? I know, you could open an orphanage, Saint Michael's home for lost causes. No? Well, stop acting like some bleeding heart Boy Scout. We both know it isn't you."_

_The scene replayed in his mind, but this time it was his hand on the gun. He could feel the welcoming sensation of the chequered hand grip against his palm, his finger curling around the trigger knowing a light squeeze would end the life of one of the thirteen pieces of leverage bound and gagged before him. It was his voice demanding answers of the petrified and cowed man at his feet, who was sobbing out answers to his questions and begging him to stop what he was doing._

_The jolt of the recoil barely registered, the sound of another lifeless body hitting the floor left him unmoved, the wails of the man begging for mercy meant nothing._

_The broken bodies of men, women and children laying dead around him as blood pooled about his feet..._

_"Do ya get it now, Kid? It's the best feelin' in the world. Doesn't it make you feel alive?"_

_Grinning, he plunged the blade of his knife into the centre of his victim's chest._

_Larry was wrong. He didn't feel alive... He felt - numb._

Michael's eyes fluttered open, a wave of nausea sending his hand out blindly reaching for one of the bowls an orderly had left beside his bed. Gagging and coughing, he got the bowl up to his chin just in time.

Afterwards, he slowly pulled himself into a sitting position. His stomach was still turning somersaults and his head throbbed so badly he wanted to pass out. Whimpering from the pain and the memory of his blood filled nightmare, he wrapped his arms around his own trembling body.

"I didn't do anything," he muttered quietly, desperately trying to soothe himself. If he kept telling himself that, then maybe he could make himself believe it.

_"The civilian casualty rate just keeps going up when you two are around, doesn't it?"_

He closed his eyes. "I've never killed a man who didn't deserve it."

_"You couldn't subdue two civilians? But you took apart a highly trained six man spetsnaz team?" Kopec raised an eyebrow, doubt written across her stern features._

He gasped, opening his eyes again to look around. He could have swore that she was there in the room with him. But he was alone. Kopec's guard dog was standing out in the hall. He could see his shadow through the frosted glass panel on the door.

The two civilians- had the two men patrolling outside Broshev's farmhouse deserved to die? He hadn't even considered knocking them out and tying them up.

He reached out with a shaking hand for the glass of water sitting on top of the bedside cabinet. Sipping the cool liquid, he tried to calm himself down. The drink didn't help and his heart began to pound as he came to a sickening realization. Broshev's sentries, both had had shotguns slung across their backs, but neither had access their weapons when he had pounced.

_"Sometimes there's collateral damage on a mission, don't worry about it, Kid. You have to weigh up the costs. You've got to look at the big picture."_

"I've never killed a man who didn't deserve it," he repeated firmly.

_"Really? Are you sure about that? Did the women and children deserve it? __You're just like him. You love the feel of a gun in your hand. You love being a high profile agent. You're an unstoppable sonuvabitch. You're respected and feared and some day soon you're going to be able to pick up the phone and call some Bureau Chief or Senator to clear away any obstacle in your path."_

_"Finally, you're getting it. You're no Boy Scout, Michael. You never were."_

Hissing in anger, he flung the glass across the room and flinched when it hit the wall and shattered, scattering slivers of glass over the floor. He remained unmoving when the Agency guard came into the room, his jacket open and his hand on his gun.

The man looked around the room and then stared pointedly at the watery mess on the floor, before turning his gaze on to the man sitting hunched up on the bed.

"It fell," Michael answered the man's stare.

It had to be the drugs they had given him. He couldn't think clearly. Things would be better once he was out of the hospital and back on his feet. He had too much time to think about the past, when he should be concentrating on his future.

_"As soon as the medical team here gives you an all clear, I intend to call you in for a full performance review and psych evaluation. This time Agent Sizemore will not be present to hold your hand."_

He wasn't worried about the review or the psych evaluation. Kopec had tried to send him on one before. He half smiled at the memory of the Den Mother's face when she came to tell him he no longer had to report to the medical department. It had been a small display of the power Larry wielded. A power the older man promised him would eventually be his, once he was ready to take the final step.

_"I've got your back, Kid. I've got the connections to keep you safe. All you have to do is stick by me. I'll get us commendations for this. After all, we're heroes.. We just exposed a Russian spy to the Chechen government."_

He watched as an orderly came into the room to clear away the mess he had made. The whole time Kopec's guard stood on full alert. He was alone, but not abandoned. He just had to hold his nerve until Larry came through on his promise.

Partners look out for one another, they cover each others backs. How many times had Larry had his back? It wasn't the only reason why he would keep quiet. It was his upbringing, too. Since childhood, there was one rule that was _never_ broken. One rule not even his father at his most drunk or vicious would break: you don't rat out your family or friends.

Wiping a hand wearily over his eyes, he let his head gently fall back onto the pillows. If he held his nerve and Larry got him off the charges Kopec was planning to use to burn him, then what? This latest act of Larry's was tying them together permanently. He was going to be stuck as 'Larry's Kid.'

_"Hmmm, it's always amazed me what some people will do when they think they have no choice." Station Chief Kopec continued to mock him, her eyes full of disdain. Or was it - - pity?_

What else could he do? What other choice did he have? He would not talk about what happened in that farmhouse. He was _never_ going to talk about it. Nothing happened. But he also knew he had used up any good will Kopec had for him. He had thrown her offers of help back in her face too many times.

_"You never did listen, Michael, not to me or your father. Now see where your pigheadedness has gotten you."_

He groaned and rolled on to his side, the smell of tobacco and stale liquor filling his nostrils, the sanctimonious whining tones of his mother invading his mind. He _could not _go back home. He _had_ to figure out some way of keeping his job.

"I did nothing," he muttered as fatigue took over his mind and body, sending him back to his nightmares.

()

"Sir, you can't go in there."

Michael forced his eyelids to open. That was the Den Mother's guard dog. He felt his heart lift. It had to be Larry coming in to tell him it was over. One of his contacts in DC must have come through. It was going to be just like before. So, why wasn't he happy about it? Another emotion crept in; a faint glimmer of despair. _It was going to be just like before._

He closed his eyes for a second. He had to pull himself together. The indecision he was feeling was going to end up getting him killed, burned or maybe thrown in prison. He hardened his resolve. He had no choice. He needed the job, the way of life; there was no way he was going to be sent home. He had joined the military at seventeen to escape the hell of his home life, he wasn't going back there. Besides that, he had spent the last nine years in either the military or the Agency. He knew no other way to live.

"I still can't let you enter, sir."

He strained to hear what was going on outside his door as Kopec's dog repeated the order.

"I have permission from your boss. Call her."

It was Sam Axe. Michael closed his eyes. This was going to be another uncomfortable visit with the SEAL commander.

Moments later, the door opened and the SEAL strolled inside.

"Hey, Mike, you feeling any better?" Sam inquired as he got a chair from the corner of the room.

"Yeah," he gave a weary smile. "I'm getting better all the time."

"That's good," Sam answered, still trying to work out the best way of getting the answers Rayna wanted.

They remained silent for a moment. Michael could only think of what was happening outside his room. Had Larry made his call? Was Kopec busy backtracking? Or had the Den Mother beaten Larry at his own game?

In the end, he could take no more. "Why are you here Sam? I mean, I thought I was under arrest or something."

Sam pursed his lips, his eyes hardened. "Okay, buddy, I've been trying to think of the best way to do this. But it's like you've already told me maybe a half dozen times, I'm not a spy, I won't get it. So I'm just gonna come out and tell you the truth, your pal Larry has managed to pull strings again. He got you both off."

Michael felt a weight lift. He let out a long sigh and couldn't help the smile that lit up his pale drawn features. He was so wrapped up in his own feeling of relief that he didn't even notice Sam's look of utter disgust,

"Oh, but that's not all. He talked his pals back in DC into handing you both medals for the great job you did.. Doesn't that make you feel proud?" Sam added.

"A medal?" That knocked Michael back, confusion showing on his face.

_They had done nothing medal worthy._ Suddenly, he felt sick as Larry's words came back to haunt him.

_"I'll get us commendations for this; after all, we're heroes.. We just exposed a Russian spy to the Chechen government."_

"Yeah, Kid, a medal for murdering a roomful of women and children. How's that make you feel?"

"I - " Michael couldn't speak.

_A medal? He didn't want a medal, they had done nothing, he had done nothing. _

He was going to be sick. His vision swam as all he could see were dead bodies piled up in the corner of the old rustic kitchen. The stench of death filled his nostrils and his mouth. He was losing himself in the vivid flashback.

_The thought of somebody rewarding them both for that evenings work sickened him._ He suddenly felt completely alone as the true horror of his situation hit. _He was going to have to stand up accept a medal and smile._

Sam studied the younger man's face. Westen lay on the bed looking pale, his pinched features expressionless, his eyes unfocused. Sam couldn't decide if his words were having an effect, or if the younger man was deliberately ignoring him.

"Hey, I tell ya what Mike, if you can lay there and accept a reward for committing murder, you're no different than that soulless monster, Sizemore. I thought you were better than that." He got to his feet and flung the chair back across the room. "I wash my hands of you."

Sam's heart sunk when he got no response. He had been wrong all along. It was as if the Mike Westen he knew had died, leaving Larry's Kid in his place.

It was the crash of the chair hitting the opposite wall that pulled Michael back to the present, he had barely heard Sam's words as the pounding of his heart blocked out all other noise.

_Panic had sent his heart rate rocketing; he couldn't do it. He couldn't let them pin a medal on his chest for what happened. _

He stared wildly about the room, his eyes fixing on Sam's back as he walked through the doorway.

"Sam!" He needed help, he had absolutely no idea what to do. "Sam, wait! I'm sorry!"

The door slammed shut and Michael realized he was completely alone. He listened to the sound of boots marching away from him down the corridor and with a choking sob his world came crashing down around him as the protective wall he had built up over the years cracked and began to crumble.

"I'm sorry," his voice barely more than a whisper. "I - " he brought his hands up to his eyes trying to halt the moisture that was beginning to flow. He had absolutely no idea what to do next, and the one person left who might have helped him had just walked out of the door.

**()**

Sam stormed out of the room letting the door slam shut behind him. Ignoring the startled look on the guard's face he strode away without a backward glance. As he made his way back towards Rayna's office Sam ran through what had just occurred. How could he have misread Michael Westen's character so badly? He had really believed the kid would step up and admit what had happened in that Chechen farmhouse. Instead the young spy had just stared up at the ceiling as if the words meant nothing to him.

Sam suddenly came a stop, when he had stormed out of Westen's room he had been angry, not just with the younger man, but with himself too. But now with a slightly clearer head, the memory of the Kid's blank staring expression had him worried. He had thought the kid was ignoring him, but what if he had been wrong?

"_Shit!_" He turned on his heel, rushing back the way he had just came.


	10. Chapter 10

**SAVIOR.**

**A/N: Thank you all as always for all your reviews. A big thank you as always to Jedi Skysinger for all her input and BETA work on this chapter.**

**Part Ten.**

The sharp slam of the door, followed by echoing footfalls fading into the distance, and he was alone.

"I'm sorry!" But he knew it was too little, too late. He had driven away the last person who might have helped him.

"I'm sorry," He repeated as his world crumbled. "I - "

Blackness enveloped him, dragging him into despair. It was as if he was back in the pit Sam Axe had pulled him out of four days ago.

With all his defenses stripped away, Michael Westen caved in. Collapsing back onto the hospital bed, he curled into a protective ball, his knees drawn up close to his chest and his arms wrapped tightly around his torso.

Great gulping breaths hitched in his throat struggling free in heart wrenching sobs. He wanted it all to stop, all the pain and the torment, all the having to hold everything inside while maintaining the illusion of unshakeable confidence.

The flood of raw emotions unleashed by Sam Axe's blunt announcement and brutal honesty in telling him how Larry had once again prevailed had floored him in every sense. He could finally see it all clearly, every act he had witnessed or committed in the last three years. Not only the people they killed, but the lives they destroyed without a thought.

_A successful team, a pair of unstoppable bastards who get the job done at any cost. _

_It was what he had wanted, it defined him. After Kiev, when Larry over-ruled Kopec the first time it had been a heady feeling. At the time he had craved it; the power to do whatever he wanted with no consequences. _

"_I don't want it anymore."_

_They were the go-to guys when there was a dirty job to be done. And they took on all the dirty jobs and did the work with songs in their hearts, jobs that nobody else wanted or had the ability to do. He knew the value of doing those jobs. It got you noticed by the right people. The sort of people who would get you out of any trouble you got into and reward you with medals._

"_I can't do it, I won't."_

"_We're a damned effective team. We can do what we like as long as the job gets done."_

"_No! Not anymore."_

"_I won't accept a medal for what we did. We - w - I - I need stopping."_

Another cold brutal truth, he needed stopping.

He sniffed and furiously wiped at his eyes. As his heart hammered away in his chest, a strange calm settled over him. There was no way out of his situation; he had dug himself into a hole following Larry's lead. There was nobody left to help him out. He couldn't quit and he was nothing without the job. He couldn't do what Kopec wanted and he was pretty sure he couldn't continue doing what Larry wanted either.

_"Mike?"_

Pressing the heels of his hands against his eyes, Michael tried to block out the terrible conclusion his mixed up mind had come up with. Another choking sob rose up in his throat and tremors shot through his body.

_"Mike, you okay in there buddy?"_

This was far worse than the pit. In that deep dark hole he had been fighting to escape and had been determined to survive. Now all he wanted was the darkness and the peace and the deathly silence.

"MIKE, it's Sam, I'm gonna come in, okay?"

"Sam?" Michael gulped, sniffed and wiped at his face. "No - I - - yeah come in.

**()()**

Sam stood outside Michael Westen's room, pressing his forehead against the door as he listened intently to the sounds of despair coming from inside the room. The muffled drawn out wheezing sobs were the only confirmation he needed that he had been right to come rushing back. Taking a deep breath he knocked lightly on the door's frosted glass panel.

"Mike?" He spoke in a low quiet tone not wanting to spook the young man on the other side. The sounds of somebody at the end of their tether had ceased, but he got no answer to his call.

"What did you do in there?" The CIA guard shot him an accusing glare. "I should report this to -"

"Give it a rest will ya." Sam muttered, dismissing the guard's concerns with a wave of his hand before calling out again. "Mike? You okay in there, buddy?"

He really didn't want to just burst through the door, but if he didn't get an answer soon it was precisely what he was going to have to do. The sounds of utter despair started up again. Dropping his head down, Sam closed his eyes and took a moment to prepare himself before entering the room.

"MIKE!" He called out clearly. "It's Sam, I'm gonna come in, okay?" He gripped the door handle pushing down to release the catch, when the choking sobs stopped again.

"Sam?" He barely recognized Westen's voice. "No! - I - - yeah, come in."

The kid's stammered reply sounded so defeated Sam wasn't sure what he was going to find when he went through the door. He gave the younger man another couple of seconds to pull himself together before he stepped inside the room.

Westen was laying on his side almost in a fetal position with his back to him. Closing the door quietly, Sam stepped further into the room.

"Mike?"

He rubbed a hand over his jaw, a little dismayed when Michael remained mute not even acknowledging his presence. Since when did anybody who worked in covert ops put their back to a door and not even glance round when somebody was behind them? Westen had to be in an even worse state than he had first thought.

"I'm just gonna get something to sit on an' then we can have a talk." Crossing the room Sam recovered the chair he had abandoned earlier and set it down facing the younger man.

Up close he could see the full effects of his earlier visit and it gave him a faint glimmer of hope that there was still something left of the Mike Westen he use to know.

"So, are you ready to come to your senses?" He kept his eyes focussed on the top rail of the headboard above the kid's head, not wanting to look directly the at the younger man's shattered expression and red-rimmed eyes.

Michael sniffed again and turned to lay on his back grimacing at the pain the movement caused. He twisted his head as far in the opposite direction as he could while scrubbing his hands vigorously over his face doing all he could to hide the signs of his breakdown from the SEAL.

Sam let out a sigh, he really wanted to help, but he needed the kid to at least show he was willing to accept that help. If he wouldn't even speak …..

"Mike, I want to help you I really do. But you need to talk to me, buddy."

"I can't," came the dull, mumbled response.

"Then there's nothing I can do fer you. Sorry, kid." Sam got slowly to his feet, the chair scraping noisily against the floor.

"Don't go."

The plea was spoken so quietly, the voice so broken, it caused Sam to sit back down. "I won't leave, as long as you tell me you've come to your senses." He pushed for an answer.

Michael shuddered and scrubbed at his face once more before finally shifting in the bed until he was facing Sam. "That m - medal. I can't t-take it," he stammered.

"If you don't want it, refuse to accept it. You _know_ what you have to do, Mikey. It's not rocket science. Explain to Kopec what that murdering psychopath did to those people in Chechyna."

He stared at the look of horror which flickered over the younger man's face as he began to babble.

"No, no,no." Michael tried to shake his head but pain from his head wound forced him to stop. "Nothing happened... I didn't do anything. I couldn't stop it - - no, no, no... I wasn't there." He pressed his fists into his eyes as if to block out everything around him.

"Okay, okay." Sam leaned forward, gently gripping Michael's arm in an effort to calm him down and to stop him turning away again. "Listen, Mike, stop thinking you're the only one whose gone through this sorta thing. We all make mistakes; it's how we deal with them that counts."

"I can't talk about it. Nothing happened," Michael mumbled stubbornly.

Sam shifted uneasily in his chair, not liking the strange mix of defiance and desperation creeping into the younger man's tone.

"Well, I don't know what I can do for you if you're not willing to even try to help yourself." He let go of Michael's arm and move his chair back. There were limits to even his patience, and Michael Westen was pushing him rapidly towards them.

"Please... I - . Please, Sam, I need this job. I have nothing else." Michael clutched desperately at Sam's arm, his fear of being left to cope on his own as he drowned in sea of conflicting emotions driving him to reach out.

Sam paused, as that one sentence transported him back ten years and to a muddy field in East Germany to the time he had made the biggest screw up of his whole life. He wondered if he had looked quite so desperate and lonely when he had pleaded with the only man who could save him.

_They were huddled down in a water and slime filled ditch,shaking from the exertion of evading an East German border patrol for three hours. The reason for their present state? He had fouled up on a massive scale. Sam remembered how scared he had been and filled with remorse for what he had done. A dumb stupid thoughtless mistake, which could have cost a lot of lives, if it hadn't been for the man at his side._

"_Virge, I need this job. I have nothing else." He had sounded just like Michael and had probably worn the same desperate expression. He'd used exactly the same words, and he was forever grateful for what Virgil had said next._

"_You're not a SEAL, Axe, you're a FRED." Virgil had growled at him, wiping the water away that was dripping into his eyes. "You really screwed the pooch on this one. This is beyond fucked up, but since no one's died, I'm gonna polish this turd for you and keep my mouth shut an' you're gonna do the same. Everyone deserves a second chance. Just remember that this is your one and only, Axe. You do anything like that again and you'll be up in front of the mast so fast your boots won't touch the ground and I'll shred your Budweiser myself. Got it?"_

"_I got it Virge, I'm -"_

"_What part of 'keep your mouth shut' didn't you understand, Sailor?"_

Sam sucked in a breath, his hand unconsciously going to his SEAL badge as he remembered Virgil's threat to shred it. Virgil had never mentioned the incident again, not even a single reference regarding his foul up. Okay, he hadn't just killed a roomful of helpless civilians, but a lot of people _could_ have died because of what he did. He had been lucky, and if it hadn't been for Virgil - - .

In a way Sam thought he could understand Michael's loyalty to a team-mate even if that team-mate was a twisted psychopath. It was obvious the kid was not going to talk, but sending him back to Larry or burning him was not the right answer.

"Mike, I'll do what I can for you. But I want your word you're done with Larry Sizemore. Even if it means you have to transfer to the other side of the world."

He watched Michael's expression carefully. The kid was a spy. His whole career was based around lying and telling people what they wanted to hear.

For the first time since he had come back into the room, Sam got a full look at Westen's features as the kid stared back at him. His expression was solemn and there was a hint of fear in his eyes.

"Okay, I'll do it." he replied in a firm, soft tone.

"I mean it, Mikey, I'm gonna do my best to talk your boss into a deal. Maybe get you sent home on a medical discharge. It should give you some breathing space while Larry gets reassigned elsewhere. But if you're jerkin' me around -"

He let the threat hang in the air.

"Whatever you want... I want him gone," Michael replied dully.

Sam got to his feet, and patted his arm. "Good man. Try an' get some sleep now, while I try to sort out a deal for you."

Michael nodded, and attempted to raise a smile, but it didn't quite come off.

Station Chief Kopec was not going to be easy to convince.

**()()**

Sam took a long slow walk back to Rayna's office. He needed time to plan an approach and then gather the necessary Intel to run the Op. He was nothing if not methodical in his strategy. By the time he entered Rayna's outer office, he had everything he needed.

Agent Benson was busy dealing with a phone call. From the agitated look on the young man's face, Sam guessed it had to be something important. So he signaled towards the Station Chief's door and got a nod back telling him it should be safe to enter. After knocking on the door, he didn't have long to wait for the order to enter.

It was a shame Benson had been busy. When going in search of favors, Sam preferred to know exactly the mindset of the person he was going to be asking for help. It made the situation so much easier to work.

He found Rayna Kopec sitting at her desk with her head tipped all the way back while the fingers of her right hand pinched the bridge of her nose. Sam took a moment to admire the view of her muted green shirt being stretched tight before clearing his throat.

"I take it Larry's latest flame didn't go quietly." He closed the door, before sliding in to the chair facing her across her desk. "She looked like a handful." He remembered the young woman's scowling expression.

Rayna let her head drop back into a more natural position. After blinking her eyes a couple of times to restore her vision to normal, she sighed. "Nurse Duggan wasn't the problem. It was the base's Chief of Nursing, Major Julia O'Reilly. She really isn't a fan of the intelligence services in general and the CIA in particular."

"She give you a hard time, Sandy?" Sam felt his confidence wane, if Rayna had just had a bad meeting with the nursing staff she was going to be even less inclined to help a rogue spy, however sorry that rogue spy was feeling.

"Apparently at the time Nurse Duggan took Sizemore to visit his colleague, _I_ had not ordered him to be confined to his room, and, although _I_ had requested the phone be removed from his room, _I_ had not issued any order requesting that _he_ was denied outside contact." She pressed her fingers into either side of her temples and squinted at him. "_She_ did however concede that Duggan's behavior was unprofessional."

"So what's happening?"

"I've had Sizemore moved to a more secure room next to the nursing station and with a camera set up watching the door, so he won't be sneaking out again. O'Reilly has promised that Duggan will be disciplined and, during Sizemore's stay, she is barred from working on the surgical ward, but basically that idiot nurse who helped cause this mess- - My hands are tied. I can't do a damn thing about it," she complained angrily.

Sam got to his feet. Moving around behind her, he dropped his hands onto her shoulders and began to massage away the tight knots in her sore neck and upper back. "So, not what you wanted?" he consoled.

She relaxed under his hands, enjoying the sensation. The whole day had been one colossal pig screw. It was late and - - .

"Sam, what happened with Westen?" She moved away from his hands and twisted in her chair so she could see him clearly.

"Ah…" He took a step back.

Rayna's eyes narrowed as she realized what he had been doing, trying to get her to relax and maybe 'help' her into a better mood before asking for a favor.

"Sam, just get it over with, what happened?"

"The kid isn't going to talk," he announced bluntly. It was like ripping off a dressing. Get the bad news over and out of the way in one swift move and then you can move on to fixing the problem.

"So Sizemore wins."

"No, no, you can still salvage at least some of the situation. Mike is really broken up. He's finally realized what they've been doing over the years and he wants out."

"Ohh, he's out alright," she agreed, back on her feet now. "I'll get the paperwork done tonight."

"Hey, hey, you didn't let me finish." Sam covered her hand as she reached for the phone.

"There is nothing to say. I asked you to talk him into giving up Sizemore. You just said he isn't going to do it, so that's the end of the matter."

"The kid as good as broke down in front of me. You burn him or sent back out with Larry, I guarantee you he'll be dead within weeks."

This made her pause. She studied Sam's expression. "You're serious?"

"I think if you were to offer him a way to get out from under Larry, he'd take it."

Deflated, Rayna sat back down. "I sent him off on a tour through Russia after the Kiev fiasco. I hoped if he had to talk about what he had done, how he had killed that six man spetsnaz team without Larry whispering in his ear the whole time it would bring him around."

"It didn't work?"

"No, Sizemore set up a radio communication between them. It would be no different this time. So his conscience is pricking him at the moment? As soon as he's back on his feet and stops feeling sorry for himself, he'll go right back to his old patterns of behavior."

Sam rubbed at his forehead. "Can't you send Mike back home, use his head wound as a reason for extended medical leave, and then find somewhere nasty to send Larry, somewhere where he'll be too busy to make any phone calls?"

"Larry has two holes in his hide. Where can I send him?"

Sam checked his watch, as his stomach began to complain about the lack of attention it had been receiving. "Look, it's late. Let's check in at the chow hall an' get something to eat while we review Larry and Mike's medical records." He picked up two folders he had had in his hand when he'd entered the room. "If we can permanently terminate the partnership, it would be a start wouldn't it?"

She gave him a sideways look and then a weary smile. "I know what you're doing, Sam, and it's not going to work. Westen is out. I've offered him all the help I can, several times over, and every single time he threw it back at me."

He smiled back at her and offered his hand to help her up. "First off, how many times did I have to ask, beg and plead with you to stop working in that dive of a bar? Which I'd like to remind you, you were too young to be working in in the first place. And how many times did you throw those offers back in my face, _Sandy_?"

She stared at him through narrowed eyes. "You more or less dragged me into that recruitment office," she accused.

"Yeah, but you let me do it. I kept asking until you were ready to listen and then I helped you get out of that life. And look at you now?" he beamed, gently cupping her cheek in his hand a soft smile on his face.

She stared into his eyes, her lips pursed and her eyes piercing. This was what she both loved and hated about Sam Axe, he was so damn persistent and - sneaky. "Yes, look at me now, about to be steamrolled into help you with yet another crusade."

"Does that mean you'll look at Mike's case again?" he asked hopefully.

"_Look_, Sam, that's all. Just look." She drew away from him, keeping eye contact, a small smile playing on her lips.

Before he could stop her, she snatched the folders from his hand and stuck them under her arm. "Food first, I don't intend to discuss Westen or Sizemore while I'm eating."

They walked out of the office to find Benson waiting for them. The young agent jumped to his feet as soon as Rayna stepped through the door.

"Ma'am, before you go out, I need to have a word with you," he announced urgently.

Rayna felt her headache go up another notch, praying that this wasn't going to be another emergency. She had more than Sizemore and Westen under her command, though sometimes it didn't feel that way.

"Is it urgent?"

"No, well - Ye..." He dropped his head, suddenly realizing that his problem wasn't going to be at the top of her concerns.

"What is it, Benson? Spit it out."

"It's Agent Meyer." He saw the question in her eyes. Agent Meyer was a training officer in Virginia working with recruits that were being considered for the Eastern European region.

"He was involved in a car crash. He broke his back," Benson added

Rayna blinked, still not sure how this was her problem. Benson continued to stare at her as if she should know why this news was so important. "Benson, I'm hungry. So, if you actually have something to say -"

"Agent Meyer was training my replacement. I'm due to leave in -"

Suddenly, Rayna got it. Benson was due to transfer back to the Balkan region in two months. A field agent position was going to be available as another agent was retiring. He was worried that she was going to hold him back. She held up a hand.

"It won't affect your transfer. I'll call Langley - later." She thought about the time difference. She had plenty of time to contact Meyer's handler to find out what was happening to his trainees.

She saw the relief register on his face, and smiled. Benson wanted to see action. He was a brilliant intelligence officer, but he wanted the excitement of the field. She wondered if she should send him over to visit Westen, just to give him a lesson in what could happen if you forgot the true purpose of the job.

"So, if there's nothing else?"

"No, Ma'am." He ducked his head, embarrassed now at bothering her with such an insignificant problem.

"Don't worry about it, Benson. I won't hold you back. If you've nothing urgent on your desk you can go now."

"Thank you, Ma'am."

Leaving Benson to clear away his desk, Sam led Rayna out of the office. "The kid is eager to see a bit of action," she explained Benson's concerns as they walked. "He trains every day at the gun range and takes part in every unarmed combat lesson he can fit in."

"Uh-huh. What's his history?" Sam asked innocently.

"He was recruited out of college, attended the farm, finished in the top five. Then served a year with Agent Meyers before coming to me, why?"

"Just wondering, that's all. Don't you think it's funny he's about the same age Mike was when he was partnered with Larry?"

He grunted as a sharp elbow was dug into his ribs.

"No talking about Westen or Sizemore until _after_ we eat."

They walked a bit further in silence before she spoke again. "But you've made a good point… I doubt Benson would last a mission with that psycho. To be honest, I think Westen has lasted longer than most of his previous partners.

Sam didn't reply, he just smiled and kept at her side on the walk across the compound. Rayna Kopec could be stubborn, but she also had strong sense of right and wrong. Given time and a few gentle nudges, he was sure she would do the right thing.

**()**

Two hours later, after a hot meal, they had retired back to her temporary quarters. With the work day finally over, Rayna let her hair out of its tight plait and with a sigh relaxed back against Sam's chest as he carefully combed his fingers through her shoulder length dirty blond hair before he returned to his earlier massaging of the tension out of her shoulders. As his fingers began to wander lower she stopped him, laying her own hands over his.

"Sandy?" he queried, his breath whispering into her ear sending a tingle down her spine.

"_You_ wanted to discuss Westen," she reminded him as she led him across the room to a cozy two sitter couch. "Come sit down and we'll go through those reports while you try to convince me he's not just trying to get out of being burned."

As he sat, sinking into the deep soft cushions, he pulled her down next to him.

"Okay," he reached out and grabbed one of the folders. "Let's just suppose you agree to Mike's medical leave and take a look at Larry's report. Hopefully, he's well enough to be sent to some hotspot."

They sat in companionable silence focusing their attention on the final pages. Finally Sam closed the folder and threw it back on the coffee table.

"Well, they're getting him up on his feet in the morning." Sam pushed the positive news. "So, by the time Mike is ready to go home, Sizemore should be ready to go off on a new mission."

She turned to face him. "You're joking, right? Or did you miss the whole part about PT for his shoulder? He won't be cleared for active service for months. Plus, he maybe on his feet tomorrow, but I seriously doubt he's going to be doing anything more than standing upright and maybe making a circuit around his bed."

Sam shifted so he was facing her, his hands gently holding her biceps. "What I was thinking, well- it's gonna be at least a week or maybe two before you have to do anything. Jamieson wants that mission debrief. He has to take it before the committee to sign off on it officially and to get support for those commendations he wants to hand out. _By then_ Larry should be _walking_ pretty good."

She smirked, a small curl of her lip, her expression showing that she believed he had slipped up. His argument was flawed. "So, he's _walking, _but not capable of _shooting_. So not ready to be cleared for active service." She dropped the smirk and caressed his cheek."I'm sorry, Sam. I don't trust Westen to keep to his word. As soon as Larry gets to him, and he will, whatever we do, the kid'll just be back to his old self."

Sam ran the tip of his tongue along his top lip. As a SEAL, he had been taught to be prepared for any situation. His walk back to Rayna's office had been very long and round about. Reaching into his pants pocket, he unfolded a single page document.

"I stopped off at the communications office and while I was there I sort of happened on this. I think it's an ideal posting for an injured spy. Just the thing to let him recover but keep him in the game..."

He paused to take a deep breath, while handing her the page. "It would involve you putting Larry up for a promotion."


	11. Chapter 11

**SAVIOR.**

**A/N: Thank you everybody who has been reviewing this story, and thank you Jedi Skysinger for your BETA skills.  
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_**Part Twelve,**_

Deep down, Rayna Kopec had known she was in trouble the second her hand had involuntarily gone to Sam Axe's cheek. She had let her defenses down completely when he had looked at her with his warm honest brown eyes, holding her attention as his tongue had flickered out to wet his top lip. She didn't even see where the neatly folded sheet paper came from. In fact, it wasn't until he spoke in that smooth as silk tone that she realized she had walked straight into his trap.

"I stopped off at the communications office and, while I was there, I sort of happened on this. I think it's an ideal posting for an injured spy. Just the thing to let him recover but keep him in the game..." He paused to take a deep breath, while handing her the page. "It would involve you putting Larry up for a promotion."

Rayna Kopec had known Sam Axe for over fifteen years; she knew exactly how determined he got when taking on a cause. She had thought she had prepared herself for whatever scheme he would come up with to sweet-talk her into helping out Michael Westen. But she had not seen _this _coming. He had to be crazy.

"Promotion? You want me to put that evil sonuvabitch Sizemore up for a promotion?" She snatched her hand away from where it had been caressing his cheek and sat back on the couch, her eyes quickly scanning the single page document.

"It's a mission brief for a diplomatic posting," Sam told her helpfully. "The U.N security Council is sending a team to monitor the war in Yemen. There's going to be envoys from Russia and China there, too."

"I can read, Sam," she snapped. "You really think that this," she shook the page in his face, "is a good idea?"

He caught hold of her wrist and then took the piece of paper out of her hand. "Larry speaks both Russian and Farsi fluently, he understands Russian foreign policy and he'd be able to keep an eye on what the Ruskies and the Chinese are up to. Jamieson would love it. I bet it would be _really easy _for you to talk him into it. I'd even be willing to bet he takes it to the committee as his own idea."

She snatched the page back and finished reading the mission brief. "It'd be like inviting a fox into the hen house," she muttered, shaking her head in refusal. "I'm not going to be held responsible for this." She had a vision of Larry taking it upon himself to sort out the diplomatic wrangling with a few well placed bullets.

"He'd be part of the US envoy's team. It would just be a little light bodyguard work," Sam pointed out as if reading her mind.

"You're joking, right?" she huffed and crossed her arms over her chest, her eyes never leaving his as she thought things through.

The trouble was, as crazy as Sam's plan was, it did have some merit. Sending Larry off to Yemen was tempting. If he didn't get kidnapped or assassinated by rival covert agents, there was always the chance that he would be caught in a bombing raid. Most important in her mind though was he would be far too busy to be keep tabs on what _His Kid _was up to.

But the plan also required her to contact Senator Jamieson and suggest that she thought Larry deserved a promotion to the Middle East as well as a commendation and a nice easy mission while he recuperated. The whole thought of calling _that _man and asking him for a favor made her skin crawl.

"You have a quite mean streak, Commander Axe," She finally broke eye contact. "You really missed your calling. Are you sure you don't want a permanent transfer to the Company?"

"No-o thanks," he laughed, drinking in her figure as she got to her feet.

"Of course, all your plotting relies on the Yemeni people keeping up their civil war until Larry is fit enough for the job and Jamieson approving the posting." She disappeared into the kitchen, and when she came out she held two open bottles of German beer in her hands. "Did you know that idiot didn't even know I'm the Station Chief of the South _Western_ region?" She shook her head in mirth.

Handing Sam one of the bottles, she sat down next to him. "Now, let's suppose for the sake of argument that the Yemeni people keep fighting and Senator Jamieson can be talked into sending his pet wet work specialist off on a diplomatic mission, what am I supposed to do with Westen? Once he's been cleared for active service, I have to send him back out to work. But his reputation is so tainted, that no sane person is going to work with Larry Sizemore's Kid."

She waited for his comeback and, then, when he didn't answer her straight away, she assumed he was stumped. "Give it up, Axe. The best I can do for Westen is to let him quietly resign and go home." She took a long sip from the bottle. "At least he'll be able to find alternate employment if he resigns."

Sam drained the bottle in one long gulp and then lounged back comfortably on the couch in a completely relaxed pose. "You agree to the plan in principal though?" He smiled softly, but she was on guard now and could see the sharpness in his eyes.

"Sending Sizemore off to the Middle East to be somebody else's problem? Yes. It's a good plan even if it does require me to speak to that sleazeball Jamieson. But unless you can come up with a plan for Westen, there's no deal. He needs a partner and nobody will work with him." She shrugged. It had been a stimulating conversation, but it had led nowhere.

"Give him a trainee," Sam spoke up. "It'll remind him how to do things properly. You know, slow him down a bit and make him think instead of just reaching for a gun."

Rayna burst out laughing. She couldn't help it. The idea was ludicrous.

"Larry's kid, training another agent? No way!" She shook her head. Getting to her feet, she moved away from the couch. "Absolutely not."

Sam was on his feet, too. "You're short a training officer, Sandy, and who better than Michael Westen to acclimate a rookie to Russian covert operations?"

She faced him from across the room, her eyes boring into his as if trying to read his mind. "You're serious? You want me to gamble some poor recruit's career on Michael Westen being capable of doing the right thing and straightening up his act?"

"You said it yourself he was a good agent until he was partnered with Sizemore. He just needs to remember what being a good agent means and, if he's working as a training officer, he's not running around unsupervised in some hotspot."

Rayna could see his point. It had been at the back of her mind every time she saw Westen that his skills were being wasted working with Sizemore. But was he still capable of change? She bit her lip and continued to stare at Sam through narrowed eyes. Finally, she reached a decision.

"Okay, here's my one _and only_ offer. _If_ I can get rid of Sizemore and _if _Westen agrees to spend however long I deem necessary as a training officer, then I'll give him one final chance. But I also want you to supervise him, at least to begin with, so this also is dependent on _if_ I can formalize your transfer as a CIA liaison. Is that good enough for you?"

"That's a lot of ifs, Sandy." Sam looked doubtful.

She placed her empty bottle down next to Sam's, a determined look on her face. "Well, it's the best I can do, Sam. Now, I suggest we stop talking about Sizemore and Westen and get some rest." She came towards him in slow measured steps. "What do you say?"

Sam knew when to back off. Rayna had at least agreed in principal to saving Mike Westen's butt. "I'm not sure about _rest_ being the right word, Sandy." He pulled her into a tight embrace, their lips locking in a passionate kiss.

**()**

Larry Sizemore was still chuckling about his sudden insight into the private life of Rayna Kopec on the morning after his encounter with the couple in the hallway. Even being moved to another more secure room hadn't even dampened his spirits. He knew the Ice Queen's game. She would keep up the pretence of control right up to the moment she had to stand in front of him and the Kid and hand them their medals.

He was looking forward to the sight; the image of that damn interfering woman finally being put in her place increased his good mood even further. It was just a shame he couldn't get word to the Kid. Sharing that bit of Intel about the Boy Scout and the Ice Queen would be sure to brighten up Michael's day.

He was brought out of his musings when the door to his room opened and one of Kopec's guard dogs stepped inside accompanying a much older nurse than the easily manipulated Nurse Cheryl Duggan.

"Well, hello sweetie, and how are you this morning?" He beamed at his new care giver.

"I'm fine, Agent Sizemore, but if you call me 'sweetie' one more time, I just might have report you for inappropriate behavior." She returned his toothy smile with one of her own. "Now, let's get you into this wheelchair and down to the PT suite."

Larry switched his gaze from the nurse to the guard dog, who smirked back at him. The young man had been on the receiving end of Larry's sarcasm since the beginning of his shift.

"Anything to oblige my dear," Larry answered smoothly. Once he was up on his feet, he would show everybody who was in charge.

**()**

The first Michael knew about a change in his circumstances was when Sam Axe strolled into his room and switched on the main overhead light, causing the normally dimly lit room to be bathed in bright light.

Letting out a groan, Michael threw an arm protectively over his eyes and tried to disappear under the sheet covering his body. He wanted to left alone in his misery, He didn't want any more sympathy and understanding. He wasn't used to it and it just left him more confused than ever.

His dad would have beaten him into the ground for breaking down they way he did and Larry-well, Larry would have sneered at his weakness and then dragged him along on some particularly violent mission to bring him back to his senses.

"Hey, Mike. Time to get up."

The sheet was jerked off his head and he found himself squinting up at Sam's no nonsense expression.

"Hey!" he complained. "What'd I do now?"

"Nothing. It's just time for you to stop laying around moping and feeling sorry for yourself," Sam answered as he dropped a heavy pile of manuals down on the trolley tray that still held the remains of Michael's half eaten breakfast. "What you need is something to take your mind off things."

With his hands free, Sam urged Michael sit up. "C'mon, let's get you up. I've got some reading material for you."

"You don't have to do this," Michael spoke in soft voice, but he was too tired to argue so he reached over and picked up the top book on the pile.

"What's this?" he queried with a frown.

Sam peered over and read the title. "That one is the latest copy of the CIA code of conduct," he answered calmly.

Michael spread the manuals out over the tray top, his eyes going from one to another.

They were all training manuals he remembered from the classroom after Raines had recruited him. He stared up at the stony faced SEAL.

"Again, what is this? I mean, it's all kids stuff." He pushed everything away and lay back folding his arms over his chest.

"You need to be up on all this stuff, if you get the assignment your boss is considering sending you on," Sam answered calmly.

" An assignment? You did it? You got the Ice Qu - - . I mean, _Kopec_ is gonna let me stay?" Michael asked eagerly. For the first time since he'd had his meeting with Rayna Kopec, he felt a small sliver of hope. He hadn't really believed Sam would be able to help him.

"It depends on a few things. I mean, y_our boss,_ Ms Kopec, is not in a particularly forgiving mood, Mike. You're gonna have to work hard to impress her." Sam had caught the Ice Queen comment and hadn't liked the kid's lack of respect. That would be something else he was going to have to work on with Westen once they got state-side.

"What does she want me to do?" Michael's eyes strayed to the books again. Was she going to make him take a test?

"She has rules. First off, she's real insistent that you promise no more contact with Larry; you don't speak to him, if you see him coming towards you in the hallway, you go in the other direction. If he gets a call through, you hang up. He's a bad influence on you, buddy."

Michael nodded slowly. He could do that. Or at least he thought he could. There was still a small part of him that didn't trust that anybody could help him other than Larry.

"Second, you go back home to the US. She's gonna use your head wound as a reason to take you off active service for a while. It'll get you clear of Larry and give you a chance to recuperate properly."

"For how long?" He felt hollow inside. Sam had spoken of an assignment, now he was talking about extended leave back in the US.

"For as long as she thinks it takes for you to get your head straight," was the older man's cryptic reply.

"She's gonna dump me back home and just leave me on the inactive list," he complained bitterly. "It's no different to being out. I might as well be burned, you know? Just get it over with... I thought _you_ were going to help me," he made the accusation without thinking, as the futility of his position started to take over again.

"I _am_ helping you. That is what all this is for." Sam gestured to the book pile. "She wants you to take over the field training of a rookie who's just lost their training officer."

Michael felt a surge of raw emotion, panic at the thought of being responsible for training another agent followed closely by anger and outrage at such a downgrade in status. He was a high ranking field operative; his goddamn name caused fear in Soviet intelligence circles.

"No, I can't! What the hell is she thinking? If I fail, it just makes it easier for her to get rid of me and she can say she tried. No, absolutely not. How the hell can I train anybody?"

_I told ya,Kid. That bitch Kopec is out to get you. She's playing games. She can't stand the fact you did such a good job. Just leave it to me. I'll straighten it all out._

"Hey, Westen!... Mike! Snap out of it."

Michael jumped as Sam's voice broke through his panic. Taking a deep shuddering breath, he collapsed back against the pillows. "If she's gonna sideline me, I might as well be out." He shoved the over the bed tray away from him.

"She just wants to remind you how to do the job properly. You know, the old boring CIA approved way of doing the job rather than the kill everybody Larry Sizemore way of getting things done. It'll be good for you and, I gotta tell ya, kid, you don't have any choice _if_ you want to stay in."

_Don't trust that wet rag, Axe. What's he ever done for you, Kid? _

Michael did his best to block out the sound of Larry whispering in his ear, advising him to tell the SEAL to go hang himself. He had no reason to doubt Sam's word. He forced himself to listen to the man who was actually in the room with him.

"It'll be okay. Your boss has arranged for me to come under her command. I'll be there during the early days. You know, to help you out, while you settle into the job."

Sam's words made everything worse. He wasn't only going back to school and being forced to remember half forgotten lessons-. "So now I need a babysitter, too," Michael sulked Kopec didn't even trust him to watch over a rookie in the safety of training scenarios.

"Mike, you gotta understand that twenty four hours ago, your boss was ready to draw up the paperwork to burn you. You were gonna be thrown out into the cold an' to be honest, it was about what you deserved. I mean, you could show a bit of gratitude that you're not on a flight back home in disgrace."

Michael dipped his head, Sam was right. He should be ashamed of himself. "But a trainee, Sam? What am I supposed to train them to do?" He shook his head. "No, it won't work." His confidence was at zero. What did he know about training anybody?

"Jeez, Mike will ya listen to yourself?" Sam snapped. He had thought the kid might be grateful for the effort he had put in getting Rayna to agree to this much. "When did ya become such a whiny lil girl?"

Michael's head snapped up, his eyes narrowed and his expression became icy. He stared at Sam through a fine red mist of anger. As his lip curled into a snarl, right at that moment if he had been armed, Sam Axe would have been in serious trouble. Larry's Kid would have dearly loved to slip a knife into his guts for that last comment.

As fast as the anger flared it dissipated, replaced with disgust. He was having murderous thoughts about the only person who was willing to help him. He deserved to be burned. Turning away from the older man, Michael stared fixedly at the far wall, hoping Sam would get the message and just go.

There was the rattle of the trolley being moved back in front of him and then the sound of a hand slamming down on the books. The noise made Michael flinch and drew his attention back to the older man.

"Hey, buddy, look at me when I'm talkin' to you." Sam had had enough of quiet understanding. Michael Westen was wallowing in self pity and needed to be jerked out of it. "Have you forgotten _I_ was with you for the whole forty eight hours after you were dragged outta that hole? I know what you and Sizemore did. So if I was you, I'd be grateful for this chance to prove I'm not just a soulless killer."

Michael stared at the SEAL. He had never seen Sam so pissed off before, but he couldn't bring himself to speak. Nothing was going the way he thought it would. He was in completely unfamiliar territory. Westens did not apologize even if they were in the wrong and Larry's Kid did not just take being called _a whiny little girl _by _a Boy Scout._

He risked a glance at Sam's stern expression and cold eyes which were boring into him. He had a vivid flashback of the drill sergeant during basic training. Slowly, without saying a word Michael reached out and pulled the first book of the pile before him.

**()**

Rayna Kopec paced in front of her desk, her arms folded over her chest and her head bowed in concentration. She had been putting off making the call all day. But finally, she could put it off no longer. She glanced at the phone sitting on her desk, her eyes narrowing before she turned away and continued to wear a hole in the linoleum flooring.

It was ridiculous really. She wasn't afraid of anybody. How could one phone call faze her so much? Admittedly, the man was a creep and made her skin crawl, but he was on the other end of a phone.

She rubbed at her arms and came to a stop. She was getting angry with herself now and then angry with Sam Axe for making her to agree to make the call. She looked at her watch. It was five pm which meant it was ten am in DC. She was running out of excuses.

_Damn Michael Westen, and damn Sam Axe for talking her into saving the kid's ungrateful ass._

Moving around the desk to her chair, she sat down and pulled the phone in front of her. She was an intelligent adult woman. She had gone from being a street kid to a CIA station chief and she had done it all by herself. Well, once Sam Axe had helped her with that first step by kicking her in the butt and dragging her into the Navy recruiting office.

So, what was she scared off? She wasn't scared; scared was the wrong word.

Picking up the phone, she took a calming breath. "Steven, get me Senator JB Jamieson please. His number is on the list."

Leaning back, she watched the phone, taking deep slow breaths she waited for it to ring. Unfortunately she didn't have long to wait. Picking up the handset, she plastered a smile on her face (and in her voice).

"Senator, Sir. Thank you for taking my call," she spoke warmly, hoping she could keep the call as short as possible.

"Ah, Ms. Kopec, to what do Ah owe the pleasure of hearing your sweet voice?" The slow sickly sweet southern drawl of the head of the Senate Intelligence Committee made her skin crawl.

"I just wanted to be sure you received Agent Sizemore's debrief, Senator." She hid her dislike as best she could.

"Why, yes, Ah did, my dear, and the recommendation for them awards, too. As Ah told the rest of the committee, Ah was sure it was just a lil ole oversight on your part. Ah told them with all them new responsibilities that a new posting brings how it can take a lil woman all on her own some time to acclimatize."

Rayna had to unclench her jaw before she could speak. "Thank you for your understanding, Senator Jamieson - " _How did that man ever get elected?_

"Oh, you just go on and call me J.B, everybody does, darlin'. Now, if there is nothing else, Ah'm kinda busy here-"

"I was hoping to talk to you about Agent Sizemore, Sen - J.B."

"Uh-huh, Larry causin' some trouble 'round them pretty nurses." The sound of his deep chuckle came through the handset.

"Oh, not at all, I wanted to talk to you about a posting that has just come across my desk which I think would be ideal for him."

There was silence on the line for a moment. She thought she could hear muffled voices in the back ground and then he was back.

"Pardon me, my dear, a job for Larry? Ah believe Ah read somewheres that he is recovering from two bullet wounds."

She could tell he had his guard up. Senator Jamieson liked to come across as a simple good old boy, but she knew that hiding behind that easy going exterior was a razor sharp mind and cold hard ambition.

"Yes, you're right, of course. But he is going to be up on his feet in the next week and I think such a valuable asset to the Company should be utilized at every opportunity. The job only requires him to sit and watch. But he would be watching high level Soviet and Chinese envoys."

"Ah you talking about that lil ole civil war taking place in the Yemen? Please correct me if Ah'm wrong here, but isn't this matter a lil out of your purview?"

"It is, but I was sure _you _would be looking at the big picture. With all those diplomats meeting in one place, it might be wise to have somebody from our intelligence services over there to monitor how the friendship between the Russians and Chinese was developing and I would just like to put Agent Sizemore's name forward. He has so much experience in the region." She closed her eyes and swallowed thickly, trying to hold down her lunch.

"Why, Ms Kopec, Ah do believe you're gittin' sweet on Agent Sizemore."

"Oh, no, why would you think that – ?" _Oh Sam Axe was going to pay dearly for talking me __into this, and_ _Westen, if he puts one foot out of line after I did this for him..._

"That there job requires a higher level of clearance than Agent Sizemore has. Ah would have to promote him. He'd no longer be your subordinate now, would he?" His innuendo was plain.

"I don't think that is relevant." She didn't want to give him the opportunity to take the conversation down that route. "You've encouraged me to consider their fine efforts and reward good work, remember? I'm just taking your advice to heart. Can I leave this with you S – J.B?"

"Why, sure thing, darlin'" He was clearly enjoying himself. "Ah'll think over your proposal and get right back to you. Them medals should be approved by next week. Ah'm thinking a nice quiet ceremony with some pictures to show our new Chechen friends."

"Thank you, J.B. I'll make sure you get the pictures as soon as Sizemore and Westen receive those medals."

With a sigh, she dropped the phone down onto the cradle and looked up to find Sam watching her from the doorway.

"That man," she growled. "_You_ owe me big for making that call."

"Did he buy it?"

"I think so. I'm sure at the next committee meeting, he'll come up with the idea for putting one of our people into the US envoy's team. All we can hope for is he goes for Larry. How about Westen?"

"Still feeling sorry for himself, but he'll do the job."

"He has to do a good job because if I catch him slacking..."

"I'll make sure he knows it, Sandy. You have nothing to worry about."

"Fine, now I need a shower. I swear Jamieson oozes slime through the phone line; just talking to him makes me feel dirty."

Sam grinned at her, "Well, if you need any help getting _clean - "_

"Shut up Sam." She ordered good naturedly, as she stepped through into the outer office.

She stopped in front of her trainee's desk. "Benson do you feel ready for your first field assignment?"

"Yes Ma'am!" He snapped to attention, his chair falling over backwards in his rush to get to his feet.

"It's okay Benson, take it easy. Sometime in the next hour a call is going to come through. A man with a Southern accent is going to demand you allow him to speak to Agent Sizemore. I want you to let the call through... But not straight away, you're going to make him think you are doing it against my orders. Understand?"

"Ma'am, this man, is it Senator Jamieson? Isn't he the Head of the Senate Intelligence Oversight Committee?"

"Agent Benson, part of a field operatives job is to lie convincingly. If you feel uncomfortable doing this work..." She let the sentence hang in the air.

"No Ma'am I don't have any problem doing the job."

Rayna smiled at him. "Good, now I'm going to my quarters. Just remember let him bully you into allowing the call."

**()**

Half an hour later, while Rayna was in the shower scrubbing the taint from talking to J.B Jamieson away with the assistance of Sam Axe. Agent Benson was fielding a call put through to him from the Surgical ward nurses station.

After ten minutes of hesitation and awkwardness he finally agreed that a Senator outranked a Station chief and ordered the nursing staff to put Senator Jamieson's call through to Agent Sizemore.

Afterwards he leaned back in his chair a wide smile almost splitting his face in two. He had just completed his first field assignment for Station Chief Kopec. Hopefully it was just the first of many.


	12. Chapter 12

**SAVIOR.**

**A/N: ****_Thank you all for your reviews, and a big Thank you to Jedi Skysinger for her BETA work. _**

**Part Twelve,**

Rayna sighed and closed her eyes, resting back against Sam Axe's bare chest as warm water cascaded down over their bodies. She nestled her head into the crook of his neck, a sultry smile curving her lips as he whispered sweet endearments into her ear.

The heady mixture of the powerful spray of warm water invigorating her muscles and Sam's strong hands softly kneading her flesh worked to clear away all thoughts of rogue spies and slimy politicians from her mind. Thoroughly relaxed and with a feeling of tranquility settling over her, she surrendered to Sam's touch completely as he cocooned her in his arms, his lips pressing teasingly soft kisses along her jaw.

"I think we should take this to the bed-" His words, made husky by desire, were suddenly cut off by a loud, annoying and incessant sound.

_Ring, ring, ring, ring._

"Sandy, baby, leave it." He tried to block her hand from reaching up to turn off the water.

_Ring, ring, ring,_

"Sam, I have-" With the tap turned off, Rayna slid open the condensation covered glass shower cubicle door.

_Ring, ring, ring,_

"Hey, c'mon now, Sandy - _Dammit_." He reached for her one last time, but she twisted out of his grip and picked up her phone.

With a huff, Sam followed her out of the shower and, after wrapping a towel around his waist, he picked up another and enclosed her in a thick fluffy bath towel.

"Benson, has the Senator called?" She leaned back against Sam's chest as he gently rubbed his hands over the towel, helping her to dry off.

"_Yes, Ma'am, I did as you said and put the call through after letting him talk me into going against your orders, but afterwards he called back and demanded that_ _I remove the guard from Agents Sizemore and Westen's doors. I tried to tell him -"_ The young agent's voice came through the phone loud enough that Sam could hear every word.

"It's alright. I was expecting this," Rayna replied, halting the young man's speech. "Just do as he ordered and remove the guards from outside both rooms."

"_Ma'am?" _

She felt Sam stiffen and back away from her, but she was in full business mode and couldn't concern herself with hurting his feelings.

"Really, it's a straight forward order, Benson. Remove the guards from outside Sizemore and Westen's doors and then when Sizemore goes to PT, _you _go in and plant at least one listening device either on or near his bed. Then you do the same again when Westen is out of his room. And _do not _speak to anybody else about what you are doing. Is that clear?"

"_Yes, Ma'am."_

"Good, now get to it." Ending the call, Rayna turned just in time to catch sight of Sam's back as he left the bathroom.

Deep down, she had known that allowing their relationship to start up again was a bad idea. It had been a couple of years since they had last hooked up, but Sam was the only person left in her life whom she completely trusted. They had history together, they knew each other's darkest secrets and lastly Sam made her feel loved, something she'd rarely experienced.

_When they reached her quarters, she had felt Sam's breath on her neck as she unlocked the door. Stepping inside she turned, barring him from following._

"_We can't let this continue, Sam. Sizemore knows or at least suspects. I can't become the talk of the base in my line of work." She continued to block his entry into her quarters and he had just stared back at her with his goddamn puppy dog eyes._

"_Look, let me in, at least while we talk. Keeping me out here in the hall is going to draw even more attention than anything we do in private."_

_He was right, but letting him inside was only going to lead to him staying the night. The trouble was she couldn't bring herself to slam the door in his face either. It had been over a year since she had spoken to a man about anything other than work. _

_Then, as if he was reading her mind, he had leaned in a little closer. "Why don't we move off base? Adana is only a coupla miles away. It's a big city, lots of people, lots of hotels."_

She pressed the edge of her cell phone against her forehead; she had honestly thought Sam would understand the situation. Muttering an expletive, she left the bathroom and followed him into the bedroom.

He was stood on the far side of the room, his back turned to the door but she didn't need to see his face to know how angry he was. The emotion was coming off him in waves.

"Sam, you're not looking at the big picture. There's more at stake here than just Westen." She threw her phone onto the bed and dropped the towel that had been wrapped around her body.

"It's a dirty trick you're pulling, Sandy," Sam, growled back angrily.

She watched as he snatched up his pants from where he had left them on the floor. _He was getting dressed? _She bit her lip and searched the floor for her own garments.

"_You_ had to know that when I asked Jamieson for a favor that he would take it as an invitation to stick his nose into this mess. He's my boss, Sam, my commanding officer. You know I can't go against his orders, but I can damn well use them to my advantage."

"Oh, I understand about following orders, but I didn't think you'd just throw Mike to the wolves like that. You know damn well as soon as he can arrange it, Larry is going to be back whispering in the kid's ear."

"Jesus, Sam, I shouldn't have to explain this to you. Removing the guards is going to make Larry believe he's won and it also means I can make sure Westen isn't just stringing us along before I have to hand him a commendation."

He glared back at her, his normally warm brown eyes cold and hard. "You're as good as setting Mike up to fail. That kid is at a crossroads. You shouldn't be allowing Larry anywhere near him."

"_You're _the one who told me Westen had his head on straight, that said _he'd_ stick to the deal. I'm just getting confirmation." With all her clothes in place, Rayna picked up her hairbrush, running it through her damp hair and dragging it mercilessly through any tangles.

"Like I said before, you're setting him up." He was sat on the edge of the bed lacing up his boots, his movements jerky as he fought to control his temper.

"Sam," she sighed out his name turning to look at him directly. "You can't protect Westen indefinitely. Sooner or later, Sizemore is going to get to him and when he does I need to be sure I can trust him to do the right thing. If he can't turn Larry down now when everything that happened is still fresh in his mind, what's the chance he'll do it later? Then what happens? How long before they do something that can't be covered up?"

Sam was back on his feet now, the scowl slowly slipping away as he stared back into her blue eyes. He hated that she had a point, that Michael Westen was an accomplished liar and the only way to be sure that he was telling the truth was to set him up and see what he did.

"This is what I hate about spies. Nothing is ever straight forward with any of you."

"It's not just about being straight forward. It's because we live in a world full of deception that we have to go to such extremes to get to the truth. Westen has been trained to pick up from a single look what it will take to get you on his side. He is capable of looking you right in the eye and telling you black is white and you'll believe him."

Rayna took a step closer and then another one until she was in front of him. They stood within arms reach of each other but not touching.

"I have to be certain, Sam. It's not just my career or yours that's on the line. What happens if we don't stop them now? How many more innocent people are going to become collateral damage because they got in the way of those two?"

She searched his face looking for some sign of softening in his expression and was rewarded as the tension slowly left his body and a hint of a smile broke the harsh straight line of his mouth. It was her turn to surrender a little of her anger as his hadn came up to gently move a couple of damp strands of hair away from her face.

"I still think you're going about this all wrong."

"And I think this is the only way to be sure," she replied, a smile causing the corners of her eyes to crinkle. "Can we just agree to disagree on this and go do something to keep our minds off the subject of Sizemore and Westen?"

"What did you have in mind?" he asked, his eyes dropping to focus on her fingers as they slowing began to unbuttoned his shirt.

()

"_Leave it to me, muh boy an' Ah'll be sure your name is the only one that goes forward fer that lil ole U.N job." _

"And the promotion, J.B. Don't forget the promotion," Larry beamed.

_"That's sure nuff on the top of my to-do list, Larry. Now, before ah get a-going is there anything else ah kin do to make your stay more comfortable?"_

"It would be nice if you could explain to Ms. Kopec that she doesn't need to have guards watching over her own men."

"_Consider it done, my boy. Ah just can't figure out whud goes on in that pretty lil head a-hers sometimes." _

Larry lay back in his hospital bed. His conversation with the Senator had been very illuminating once he had gotten past the charming, deep-south persona the man liked to hide behind. He had won; that bitch Kopec had finally given up the fight. He glanced down at where his slippers sat on the floor. He still had six little pills which if given all at once would induce a nice little heart attack.

Maybe he would give the over worked little woman a present after she had handed them their awards. If the heart attack didn't kill her, it would end her career in the field. It would put her back in DC behind a desk where she belonged. _Yes, he was just full of good ideas at the moment._

Half an hour later, Larry's good mood increased even further as the guard on his door took a call and then left without a word. Glancing at the clock on the wall, he checked the time. It was late and he was tired. There was plenty of time to check on the Kid tomorrow and break the good news to him.

()

With nothing else to take up his time, Michael Westen spent every waking moment reading through the training manuals Sam Axe had left for him. Without them, he was pretty sure he would be slowly going insane thinking about what he had done and what the consequences were going to be. The deaths in that Chechen farmhouse still weighed heavily on his mind and, whenever he fell asleep, the images of Larry's victims haunted his dreams.

He still had trouble believing he was expected to take over the training of another agent. He stared blankly at the first page of a chapter titled: Early Training Missions, Surveillance in Hostile Environments.

_Their safe house in Havana had been in the old city, one of many small apartments above the rows of small shops which lined the narrow winding streets. They had already had one awkward discussion where he had to admit he didn't speak or understand a word of Spanish._

"_Your 201 file said you were born and raised in Miami an' you're telling me you don't speak a word of the language?" Moments afterwards, the anger had faded and Larry had turned back to him with a toothy grin back in place. "This is why you should never believe what it says in a co-worker's dossier, Kid. You're just gonna have to keep ya mouth shut an' smile a lot." _

_And that's what he had done as at first Larry had insisted on a drive around the whole of the city followed by a walk along the narrow winding streets of the old part of the city until they reached the safe house that had been prepared for them. _

_As soon as they arrived at the top floor dark musty smelling apartment, he had set about showing his older, far more experienced colleague he could do the job. After all, this wasn't his first mission. He could still remembered the faintly amused expression on Larry Sizemore's face as he watched him pin up a map of the area on one of the walls and carefully mark out the run down mansion where they believed their target was residing._

"_Whatcha doin', Kid?" The older man had asked when he had dug into his canvas backpack searching for binoculars and their radio comms. _

"_Surveillance, Larry. Do want the first shift or should I -?"_

"_You're kiddin', right?" Larry had given a disgusted snort and picked up a bullet proof vest, throwing it at his head. "What the hell have Raines and Card been filling your head with?"_

"_But, we've only driven past the place once on the way here. We need to -"_

"_Jeez, am I goin' to have to teach you everything? Just follow my lead, Kid. We're workin' against the clock here, an' you want to spend a week learning the guards' schedule?" Larry handed him two stun grenades to go along with the vest. _

_He stabbed a finger over the position of the mansion suspected of containing their target. "I've already organized for a little disturbance to take place out the front, so while the guards are dealing with that we're going over the fence at the back of the property." _

_He pointed to a spot where they had noted a blind spot on the security cameras. "Once inside, you're going to keeping shooting with that assault rifle of yours until we reach the target's room. At that point, we send in the stun grenades, grab our man and get out. We'll be back in the U.S by nightfall."_

"_But, what about -?" He had been filled with questions. It was nothing like the training missions he had run or like the couple of missions he had gone on with Station Chief Kopec before she became a station chief._

"_There is no' what ifs' or 'what about,' Kid, All you have to do is follow my lead. C'mon, stop pouting. This will be fun." _

_He remembered Larry's wide toothy grin and the encouraging slap on the back he got just before they scaled the wall of a large mansion in the Miramar district of Havana. _

There had been so many things he had learned from his training officer, Tom Card, which Larry had dismissed as useless or he had later changed of his own accord. How could he turn his back on methods he knew worked? Or even worse, how he could he teach somebody a method he had no faith in?

He dropped the book down on the table unread and picked up another .This one outlined approved interrogation techniques, but after opening the first page, he dropped it back down. He had never liked Larry's way of getting answers, even when it worked.

Suddenly he was back there again.

"_Who did you tell?" Larry snarled out his questions, demanding answers from the weeping figure at his side. _

"_N- no nobody, I told nobody," the little man had sniveled, crying out when Larry fired his gun point blank into the chest of the one remaining man in the group of captives._

_The other prisoners, all securely tied up and gagged, stared with open eyes as Larry continued with his questions before he turned his murderous gaze upon is protégé._

_"Go keep a lookout. There may be patrols in the area." _

_And, coward that he was, he had left without a word. _

()

"So, what's the Ice Queen got ya doin, Kid?" Larry stood framed in the door way enjoying the look of surprise his sudden appearance caused.

"How the hell did you get in here?"

Larry frowned at the not so welcoming tone in the Kid's voice, but the frown quickly turned to an indulgent smile when he realized Michael hadn't noticed he no longer had a guard watching his every move. The younger man was obviously just startled at his sudden appearance.

"I told you, Kid. I've got your back. Kopec has been put in her place, so you don't have to worry about her anymore."

He limped slowly across the room, leaning heavily on the walking frame he was forced to use, while doing his best to hide the pain he was feeling each time he put weight through his injured hip. Reaching the bed, he picked up the book Michael had just thrown aside.

"So, what's all this for?" he asked, reading the title before tossing it back onto the table.

He watched as the kid finally pulled himself together and plastered a welcoming smile on his face. "Kopec wants me to review Company protocol. What happened to the guard?"

"Good old J.B came through again. I'll introduce you to the old bastard one day, Kid, when you've grown up a bit," he laughed and then carefully lowered himself on to the chair which had been left next to the bed. "So what have the docs said? How long 'til you're going to be back on your feet?"

"They haven't told me anything. I'm on this-" he showed Larry the I.V lines in his hand. "For at least another couple of days and they haven't let me outta bed at all yet. So I guess it's going to be a while."

"Uh-huh," Larry looked around the room, before turning back to his protégé with a leer on his face. "Hey, I've gotta prime piece of gossip for ya, something that'll cheer you up a bit." He paused for a moment and then announced. "The Ice Queen has thawed."

Michael gave him a puzzled look.

"Sam Axe has been putting his cold water training to good use, _penetrating_ a hostile environment," he chuckled, while making a lewd gesture.

"_Sam- and Kopec?_" Michael choked, his eyes going wide in shock.

"Yeah, _good ol'_ _Sam Axe_, him and the Ice Queen are getting very cozy."

"How do you - - How did you find out?" Michael couldn't believe it. He knew Sam had a way with the ladies, but Kopec? No, he didn't believe it.

"Ooh, lotsa of little things. He was all over her out in the hall the other day and when I made some comment, he got right up in my face," Larry beamed as he relived the scene in his mind. "It was quite sweet really, Axe playing the white knight defending his lady's honor. Ha, as if Kopec needs any defending. I doubt anybody else has ever had the nerve to risk frostbite. Hey, maybe that's why Axe went there... You know going where no man has gone before, or maybe she has a thing for dumb animals."

Michael sat staring off into space, not quite the response Larry had expected.

"So, what did the Ice Queen have to say to you?" Larry changed the subject. "Has she told you about the commendations? J.B is going to rush 'em through. We should get them in couple of days."

"Commen- I thought -" Michael went pale.

"Thought what, Kid? I told you to have faith in Ol' Lare. I've got it all sorted out. In a couple of days, the den mother is going to have to stand up in front of us and all her little pups and give a nice little speech about what a bang up job we've just done."

Larry was beginning to get angry as Michael went back to ignoring him. He glanced up at the clear bags filled with fluid hanging off a pole attached to the bed. _They must have the Kid drugged up; that had to be it._

"Hey, Kid! Pay attention when I'm speaking to you." Michael's head snapped around to face him. "Now, after we get our awards, I understand Kopec is going to ship you state-side. I want you to wait until you hear from me before you accept a new posting. You understand me?" He locked eyes with the younger man making sure his words broke through the Kid's obvious drug haze.

"Yeah, I understand," he replied dully.

"Good, cuz I'm being transferred to the Middle East. I'll be leaving as soon as I can walk without this damn thing." He gave the walking frame a kick. "I can't get you transferred until you've passed a medical declaring you fit for duty. So when you go for the medical, you let me know and I'll have J.B prepare your papers, okay?"

Michael nodded. He was slipping away again, ceasing to pay full attention.

"I'm going back to my room. Just remember what I've said. I'm pretty sure Kopec isn't finished with you yet, so watch what you say and watch that temper of yours. Once we're both in the clear and we have those awards, I think the Ice Queen will have finally outlived her usefulness." He laughed at the cryptic comment and got to his feet.

After taking a couple of slow heavy steps towards the door, he looked back. "And, Kid, stop readin' that trash. It'll only get you killed in the long run."

()

_Sam Axe was sleeping with Rayna Kopec? _The words had stunned Michael, he would have never marked those two as a couple. That little piece of gossip under normal circumstances would have caused quite a bit of mirth. Sam was a womanizer with a girl in every port. So what the hell was he doing playing around with a CIA station chief? There had to be plenty of better looking, easier women on the base for him to mess around with.

And then her, the Ice Queen. In the whole time he had known Rayna Kopec, there had never been a single rumor of her having a life outside of her job. Yet within a couple of days of arriving in Incirlik, she was sleeping with Sax Axe?

Why would he? Hell, why all of a sudden would she choose to have an affair with a SEAL? He knew of plenty of men in the intelligence world who had taken a run at Kopec and failed. So why Sam?

His paranoid mind jumped to a simple conclusion: she was using Sam to get to him. Sam told her about what he knew had happened in that farmhouse. It was Sam that had got him to agree to splitting up the partnership. She had to be using Sam to manipulate him into giving up Larry. Probably hoping that after a couple of weeks of babysitting a rookie. he would rat out all the questionable things Larry had done in the past for a chance to get back in the field.

He pushed the over-the-bed table away in disgust. It was all just a trick. It explained the commendation, too. Sam had promised him. _If he stayed away from Larry, if he_ _accepted the job as a training officer_. Sam knew how much he wanted to avoid having to accept a medal for something so undeserving, so heinous. They must have thought springing the award on him would make him break...Suddenly, he realized Sam hadn't promised any such thing. He had never said anything about stopping the commendation.

Michael sat upright, dropping his head forward as he pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. He was letting his paranoia take control. He had to slow down and think things through calmly. The next time he saw Sam, he was going to have to ask him about what was going on.

()

Rayna sat at her desk, her fingers drumming a monotonous tune as she listened to a recording of Larry's visit to Michael Westen.

"Well, I think you were right about getting rid of the guards. Larry definitely thinks he's in charge." Sam shifted his chair back slightly readying himself for a fast retreat if Station Chief Kopec chose let loose the anger he could see building.

"But we haven't learned anything new," she replied, pushing the anger away. "Sizemore is a pig, which we already knew, and Westen barely spoke a word. Do you think he knows Benson put ears in his room?"

Sam shook his head. "No, Benson said he was out cold when he went into the room and I believe him. That boy is out to impress you."

Rayna nodded and leaned back in her chair. "What did you make of Westen's response? He didn't tell Sizemore about the offer to split them up, or anything about you knowing about Larry's latest murder spree."

Sam crossed his arms over his chest, Michael's silence was worrying. He knew the young man had serious trust issues and now that trust had been shattered by a few words. His boss was sleeping with the only person he believed was on his side.

"I think I should get down there and do some damage control," Sam answered getting to his feet. "The kid's paranioa levels must be sky high at the moment."

He was at the door when she spoke. "Sam, remind him of the deal. Make sure he stays focused on that."

()

He was surprised when barely ten minutes after Larry had closed the door, it swung open again and the man with all the answers stepped into the room.

"Hey, Mike," came the casual greeting as Sam Axe strolled across the room.

"Hey, Sam," Michael ground out the reply. _Keep calm, _he ordered himself as he felt his temper begin to rise.

"Something on your mind, buddy?" Sam asked lightly as he finally sat down in the same chair recently vacated by Larry.

Michael couldn't bring himself to answer immediately. So he took a moment to study the older man's features, carefully searching for clues of his guilt in his face. "The guard has gone from my door. I was wondering if my status has changed?" he asked eventually, still unsure about the best way to broach the subject of Sam's loyalty.

"I thought you knew." Sam raised an eyebrow. "I saw Larry in the hall. I thought he'd have told you. All the restrictions on both of you have been dropped."

Michael's lip twitched. He had him. He didn't know what exactly Sam was lying about, but the man was uncomfortable about something.

"Yeah, Larry," It was now his turn to feel uncomfortable.

G_od, he hated having to ask about Sam's personal life and the thought of Sam with Kopec... _He inwardly shivered.

"He said something about - -" Michael paused before taking a deep breath and changing tack, trying to think of a way of phrasing the question. "I was wondering how long you've known Kopec? I mean, she's got you acting like some sort of cut-out. So I was just _wondering_ what you got out of the deal?"

"I don't think that it is any of your business, Mike," Sam replied bluntly, a cold edge creeping into his tone. But before Michael could interrupt, he held up a hand. "But, on this occasion, I'll give you a break. I've known her for over fifteen years. I was a raw ensign and she hadn't decided on a career path when we first met. But by the time I saw her on my second furlough, she had made the choice to join the Navy. We attended officer candidate school together and over the years we've kept in touch. So, basically we're friends. That satisfy your curiosity?"

Michael sat perfectly still, his face devoid of emotion as he rapidly processed the information. They had known each other for over fifteen years and neither of them had ever mentioned it to him. He opened his mouth to speak and then shut it before he uttered the first words that had come into his head. Finally, he came up with something to say.

"Larry mentioned that you an' Ko - - you and my boss. That you were, well, you know..." He gave up trying to get the question out. But the look of thunder he got from Sam told him the other man knew exactly what he was asking.

"He told you I'm sleeping with your boss? Is that what you want to know?" Sam asked bluntly.

"Yeah, I do," Michael replied. Now that the question was out, he wanted the answer. He wanted to hear Sam explain how he could screw Rayna Kopec and not tell him.

"What I do when I'm off duty and in the company of my friends is nobody else's concern, Mike, and it has absolutely no effect on what I do when I'm on duty. Is that clear?"

"It concerns me," Michael snapped back. _I knew it! Sam is working with Kopec against me. They were going to railroad me into giving up Larry if I wanted any chance of saving my career. _"You're making all these promises and how do I know -"

"How do you know you can trust me?" Sam shot back at him, his face suffused with anger.

The accusations dried up in Michael's throat in the face of the older man's rage.

"You tell me, Mike. How many missions have we done together, even back before you were a damn spy? How about when I risked my own life to haul you ass clear of that ambush in Panama or when I pulled you out of that pit when I coulda' just called in a drone strike to clean up the mess?"

A drone? The brass had planned to eradicate him with a missile? He hadn't known, but it did no good now because before he could speak, Sam was on his feet, glaring down at him and letting him know exactly how he felt.

"And before you start in about how your boss just wants to get rid of you, how about remembering all the chances she's given you in the past three years? And what did you do with those chances? Huh? You know, people who get in Larry's way have a funny way of ending up dead, but she still tried to help you out, didn't she?"

Michael paled as he was suddenly reminded of Larry's comment about the Ice Queen outliving her usefulness. But it wasn't only that. He could think of at least three other people who had upset his mentor only for them to die mysteriously days later.

"Maybe you should try remembering how she came back for you in Termez instead of leaving you behind for some tribesman to cut off your head."

Michael gulped as Sam hit him with another bad memory. He remembered very clearly the fear he had felt in that Afghani tent and the relief when Rayna Kopec had lifted the veil covering her face and had knelt at his side to cut him free.

"How can you trust me?" Sam was leaning over him, making sure he couldn't escape from the truth being rammed down his throat. "I gotta better question for ya, buddy! How can you still trust Larry Sizemore after everything you've seen him do? If that doesn't tell you how much three years with that ghoul has screwed up your head, then I don't know what else to say to you, Mike!"

Sam stood up straight and took a step back. Michael couldn't think of a thing to say. He felt barely two inches tall. Nobody had ever let him have the truth like that before.

"I'm sorry," he eventually got the words out. "I - I let Larry... no, that's a lie. This was all me. I trust you, I won't question you again." He looked away, overwhelmed by what the apology had meant to him.

"O-kay then," Sam spoke as if nothing had happened. Michael flicked his eyes up as the table was moved back in front of him. "You'd best get back to studying. Ms Kopec is arranging for you to get the notes and schedules from the training officer you're replacing. She's also looking at getting Larry moved over to the PT suite. It's over the other side of the hospital."

Michael wiped a hand wearily over his face. He felt both physically and emotionally shattered and it wasn't even mid-day. All he really wanted to do now was close his eyes, but one look at Sam's cool expression told him he was expected to get back to his books.

"Is this my atonement?" he asked quietly.

"It's what you should have been doing in the first place instead of letting a creep like Sizemore fill your head up with crap." Sam picked up the book on interrogation techniques and smiled over at the younger man.

"Here, I'll help. There's a quiz in the back. Let's see how you do."


	13. Chapter 13

**SAVIOR.**

**A/N: Here is big thank you to everybody who has reviewed and put this story on their alerts and favorite lists. Also thank you to those who have pm asking for more chapters. I'm sorry for the delay in updating this story but I've been held up by a bit of RL... Any way no more excuses.  
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**Thank you Jedi Skysinger for your suggestions and BETA of this chapter, thank you Amanda Hawthorn and Daisyday for cheering me up every day.  
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**Part Thirteen.**

"Hey, Kid! Pay attention when I'm speaking to you... Now, after we get our awards, I understand Kopec is going to ship you state-side. I want you to wait until you hear from me before you accept a new posting. You understand me?"

_"Yeah, I understand."_

_"Good, cuz I'm being transferred to the Middle East. I'll be leaving as soon as I can walk without this damn thing... I can't get you transferred until you've passed a medical declaring you fit for duty. So when you go for the medical, you let me know and I'll have J.B prepare your papers, okay?"_

_"I'm going back to my room. Just remember what I've said. I'm pretty sure Kopec isn't finished with you yet, so watch what you say and watch that temper of yours. Once we're both in the clear and we have those awards, I think the Ice Queen will have finally outlived her usefulness."_

_"And, Kid, stop readin' that trash. It'll only get you killed in the long run."_

Station Chief Rayna Kopec drummed her fingers on her desktop, her eyes narrowing as she listened to Larry Sizemore give his injured protege his version of a pep talk on how to behave while he was going to be left unsupervised. Lost in her own thoughts, she flinched at the sound of Sam Axe pushing back his chair.

He tried to draw her out and quell what he mistakenly thought was anger. But he was reading her mood all wrong. She was used to the disrespect Larry Sizemore showed her and all the female staff in her office. Every one of her attempts to get him censured for his attitude had fallen on deaf ears.

_"Larry Sizemore is a specialist, a very valuable asset. You need to start working with him instead of against him... Unless of course you don't think you're capable of doing the job of a Station Chief?" _

She had heard various versions of the same speech during her first couple of years as a Station Chief and, in the end, had worked out her own way of dealing with the psychopath.

"I think I should get down there and do some damage control. The kid's paranoia levels must be sky high at the moment."

She was grateful that Sam hadn't picked up on her inattention, he was already at the door when she called out to him. "Sam, remind him of the deal. Make sure he stays focused on that."

But Rayna wasn't thinking about Michael Westen. Her mind was fixed on what she had heard on the tape and what Sam had obviously missed.

With Sam gone to repair the damage done to Westen's fragile psyche by Larry's little visit, Rayna leaned forward to press the replay button on the recording. Then leaning back in her chair, she closed her eyes as the sound of Larry hobbling into Westen's room came through the small speaker on her desk.

_"Thought what, Kid? I told you to have faith in Ol' Lare. I've got it all sorted out. In a couple of days, the den mother is going to have to stand up in front of us and all her little pups and give a nice little speech about what a bang up job we've just done."_

She knew all about 'the den mother and her pups' sobriquet and it didn't bother her in the least. In many ways, den mother was an apt description of who she was and what she did. She liked to think she looked after her staff and did her best to help them work as a solid unit.

_"Hey, Kid! Pay attention when I'm speaking to you. Now, after we get our awards, I understand __Kopec is going to ship you state-side. I want you to wait until you hear from me before you accept a new posting. You understand me?"_

_"Yeah, I understand,"_

Westen's sullen response had been encouraging. Larry's Kid was definitely unhappy following his mentor's orders.

_"Good, cuz I'm being transferred to the Middle East. I'll be leaving as soon as I can walk without this damn thing. I can't get you transferred until you've passed a medical declaring you fit for duty. So when you go for the medical, you let me know and I'll have J.B prepare your papers, okay?"_

She opened her eyes. She was fairly certain Sam had been too annoyed by the Ice Queen and frostbite comments to notice; Larry was talking about Jamieson as if the Head of the Intelligence Oversight Committee was nothing more than his lackey.

If it were true, that meant Larry had to have some sort of leverage over the Senator and if she could find out what it was... Her smile grew wider; she finally had something on the out of control bastard.

_"I'm going back to my room. Just remember what I've said. I'm pretty sure Kopec isn't finished with you yet, so watch what you say and watch that temper of yours. Once we're both in the clear and we have those awards, I think the Ice Queen will have finally outlived her usefulness."_

She leaned forward and switched off the recording, her heart was pounding in her chest. When she had set up to record a meeting between Sizemore and Westen, she had been hoping that it would give her a read on Westen's true state of mind. But this was just so much better.

She searched through the drawers on her desk until she found an envelope. The recording on its own was dangerous only to herself, but it gave her a starting point to finally get rid off Larry for good. Sealing the recording in the envelope, she got to her feet and opened the door to her outer office.

"Steven," she called to Agent Benson. "Put this in with my personal files."

She wasn't going to bother Sam with this; he had his hands full keeping Westen in line. Besides, Larry Sizemore was a CIA problem and it was one she intended on dealing with herself.

**()**

Two hours of being drilled by Sam Axe on CIA approved interrogation techniques had left Michael Westen's already sore head reeling. _When had he become so lazy? So devoid of normal human emotion?_ He had to force himself to pay attention as his mind kept drifting back to Larry's altogether different approach to getting information.

While Sam spoke about the importance of preparing where the interrogation was to take place and how to work on building up some trust with the subject who had the information which was required, all Michael could think of was how Larry rarely bothered with any of the procedures covered in the CIA manuals.

_Larry usually started the interrogation process with a bullet or a stabbing knife wound to the big muscles in the thigh. Painful and very bloody, the injury got the interrogatee focused. It showed them how serious they were about getting the answers they required. If that first wound didn't do the trick, Larry would then go for a shoulder or, if he was particularly pissed, he'd slow things down by taking out a knee or an elbow. But whatever mood the spy was in, the results were always the same. He got the answers they wanted._

_The first time he had witnessed Larry's intelligence gathering techniques, he had been sickened. But afterwards while they cleared away all the blood and dumped the body, Larry had explained it all and what he said had made so much sense._

_"We're at the sharp end here, Kid. We're field agents. There's no time for polite conversation. We had to find out what was in that guy's head and what I got out of him is gonna help save a lot of American lives."_

_It was true. Before he had died, the terrorist had spilled the details of a kidnapping plot taking place in Montenegro. Their actions meant that a SEAL team managed to sweep in and rescue the victims before they disappeared into the wilderness of the mountains close to the Serbian border._

_By the time they went on their first deep cover assignment in Bosnia and then into Serbia, he had witnessed so many vile acts that whatever Larry did to forward their mission seemed tame in comparison. When they finally caught up with their target Savic, he was no longer just a willing accomplice but an active participant in the intelligence gathering process._

_"You want to get out of this hell hole? Here's what's stopping you." Larry had thrown Savic's body down on the ground in front of him. "The quicker this guy gives us what we want, the quicker we can return to civilization. It's up to you, Kid."_

_Later in a deserted shack he had leaned in close, pressing the Serbian Arm's dealer back against the bare stone wall. The blade of his hunting knife pricked the skin of the man's neck._

_"The American guns, where are they stored?" He had breathed the words into the terrified man's ear. "If you don't talk I'm going to cut your throat..." He had paused, twisting the knife so the tip broke through the skin, sending a thin trail of blood down the front of the man's shirt. "Maybe you should keep quiet. It's been a long time since I felt hot blood run over my hand... I've missed it." And that had only been the start of Savic's final days on earth._

_He had used all his pent up frustration, all his anger and his hatred for the people he was being forced to live with to get the answers they needed. All the while Larry had stood back in the shadows looking on like a proud parent, occasionally offering up suggestions or urging him on to greater violence._

_By the time Sam Axe had arrived to identify the war criminal they had accidentally discovered, Savic had given up all the information he possessed._

_It had only been when they were called back to the safety of the CIA base that he had trouble coming to terms with the things he had seen and done. Late at night he would wake up in a cold sweat with his heart pounding in his chest as his nightmares forced him to remember his actions._

_But Larry had helped him through it all. "What are you upset about, Kid? Savic? You think for one minute that bastard wouldn't have killed you if he got the chance? We did the world a favor getting rid of him. We're the heroes here. What we did saved hundreds of lives. It was necessary."_

_Larry had continued with the praise, pointing out that he was no longer one of Kopec's pups. He was on his way to becoming one of the Company's unstoppable bastards, a top field agent._

_He wasn't used to so much praise, or having his mistakes glossed over, and then his temper snapped and when he went too far, attacking Agent Stanwyck in front of witnesses, Larry had been there to sort it all out for him._

_"It's o-kay Kid, don't worry about it. I've already spoken to the Ice Queen. It was just a little misunderstanding. Besides, I've gotta treat fer you, there's a weapons dump in Belgrade that needs blowing up. Fancy a quick trip back into Serbia?"_

"Hey, Mikey." Sam's hand waved in front of his face as the SEAL tried to get his attention. "You okay, kid? I think maybe we should call it a day."

"Sorry," Michael swallowed and rubbed at his eyes, trying to force himself to focus. "I'm just a bit tired that's all." He watched as Sam piled up the training manuals and placed them on the corner of the table.

"Are you sure that's all it is?" Sam asked. "I mean, you're not having second thoughts about what we're doing?"

Michael sighed and shook his head. He could see the older man's concern written all over his face. "No, no more second thoughts... Honest." He offered a weary smile to try help convince Sam he was being truthful.

"Good," Sam replied, giving Michael's arm a friendly squeeze. "Cuz, we really need you to have ya head screwed on straight over the next coupla days."

Michael paled as he thought about the meaning of those words. "The medal ceremony," he muttered, all signs of the earlier smile gone from his face. "Can't you accept it for me? Y'know, tell the Ice - Ms. Kopec, I'm too sick to attend."

It was Sam's turn to shake his head. "You had your chance to do the right thing, Mikey, but you blew it. So now you're stuck dealing with the consequences."

"Yeah, I know, I get it." He hung his head down, getting the Station Chief to hand out medals had been all Larry's idea. It was the older spy's way of showing Rayna Kopec that she had no control over their actions. Another thought hit him like a blow to the guts, something he had not realized until that moment. It was also Larry's way of tying them together in the lie about what had happened in the foothills outside Grozny.

"Good." He was so wrapped up in his own thoughts, he barely heard Sam speak and then before the older man could say any more, the door opened and two nurses entered the room with a trolley tray.

"Gentlemen," one of the nurses greeted them. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave, sir," She spoke to Sam. "Agent Westen, the doctor will be coming into see you soon. We need to clean your wound again."

"Great," Michael sighed, _some more people to poke and prod at his head wound._

"I'll be back in the morning, Mikey," Sam laughed at the younger man's pouty expression as the nursing staff began to set up to remove the dressing from the ugly head wound.

"Please, Agent Westen, just keep still."

With Sam gone from the room, Michael closed his eyes and leant forward as far as he could so the nurses could get on with their job. He was always the cooperative patient, at least while he was tethered to the bed. Closing his eyes, he tried not to flinch as the normal steady throbbing pain he was becoming used to changed to a sharp stabbing sensation as the dressing was removed.

_"You had your chance to do the right thing, Mikey, but you blew it." Sam's accusation came back to haunt him. "So now you're stuck dealing with the consequences."_

_"People who get in Larry's way have a funny way of ending up dead."_

Michael paled. He could think of at least three people who had somehow got in Larry's way only to die mysteriously days later. He knew he was safe, or at least he thought he was; there really was no telling with Larry. But just like he couldn't turn Larry in, he was fairly certain Larry couldn't kill him.

_"Once we're both in the clear and we have those awards, I think the Ice Queen will have finally outlived her usefulness."_

Michael hissed and bit his lip as the level of pain went up another notch. Whatever they were doing to the back of his head, he wished they would hurry up and get it over with. Pushing away the pain, he turned his mind back to Larry's words about Kopec. Would he really make an attempt on her life?

_Maybe, o-kay probably. Dammit, of course he would. Who was he trying to fool? Larry had a linear brain- he wanted something, he got it, regardless of the cost to anybody standing in his way. If he wanted the station chief dead, she would die. It was as simple as that._

_Stanwyck wasn't the first man he knew about who crossed Larry one too many times. But Kopec's old trainee stuck in his mind. Alan Stanwyck had been a major grade A pain in the ass from the first time they had met the newly qualified agent._

_It was Stanwyck who he had nearly killed when the jumped up little clerk had tried to cut in on his conversation with the pretty new girl working in the communication centre._

_And he remembered Larry's reaction to hearing about his protege being dragged in to see the Station Chief over the incident._

_"Don't worry about it, Kid, I'll sort it all out. Some people just don't know their place in the world."_

_At the time, he had thought Larry meant to talk to Kopec about her overbearing trainee. But on their return from Belgrade when word reached them of Stanwyck's death, Larry had paused briefly before smiling broadly and patting him on the back._

_"Well, I guess it just goes to prove the old saying: some people live and some people die."_

A sudden pull on his hand and Michael realized he has almost fallen asleep while the nurses were freeing him up from the I.V lines.

"Ah, Agent Westen, how are you feeling today?" Michael raised his eyes to find his doctor standing beside the bed holding a clipboard in his hand.

"Fine, a lot better thanks." He gave the doctor his standard toothy smile and gracious answer to any queries about his health.

_"Hide your weaknesses, Kid, cuz there's always somebody waiting to exploit you... If you let 'em."_

"Good, well the results on your last round of blood work has come back. You're clear of infection, so you can come off the I.V and after another scan maybe we can see about letting you out of bed."

_Finally_, Michael's grin widened, _a bit of good news_. He was desperate to get out of the bed and back on his feet. All the laying around trapped by medical equipment had left him feeling vulnerable and he was sure that was what had partially fuelled his paranoia.

()

The following morning, after a hot shower and a hearty breakfast, Sam Axe made his way from the barracks over to Station Chief Kopec's temporary office. His mind going back over the previous evening. Having left Westen in the tender hands of the nursing staff, he had met Rayna for a working dinner. The whole conversation had been over Larry and his not so subtle threat.

They had both ended up agreeing that to protect her reputation they needed to let things cool down and, for her safety given Larry's skills at assassination, she would continue to live off base. So while she kept the hotel room in the nearby town of Adana, he returned to his own temporary quarters on the base.

Reaching the CIA Station Chief's office, Sam almost ran into Agent Benson on his way out of the door. "Hey, your boss in?" he asked, before the trainee agent could run off on whatever errand he was being sent on.

"Yes, in fact, she asked me to go and find you," Benson replied.

"Well, good job on that," Sam smiled back and stood clear of the door frame so the young man could step through.

As Benson stepped into the hallway, Sam noticed the stack of folders in his arms. He caught a glimpse of a 201 stamp on the top folder. "Are those for Agent Westen?"

"Yes," Benson nodded. "The information on his trainee and all Agent Meyers training notes."

"May I?" Sam was already reaching for the top folder, pulling back the cover. He let out a whistle, before raising his eyes to look Benson in the eye. "Take my advice, kid. Drop that on the table and then get the hell out of the room."

"You think - - "

"I think when Mikey opens that folder, if you're in the room, that file will be wrapped round your head."

Benson studied the photograph attached to the first page and realization suddenly dawned on his face. "I see what you mean, sir."

"Good. Well, get going and remember to get out of the room before he opens that top file."

Sam watched the young agent disappear along the hallway with a grin on his face before he crossed the room to knock lightly on Rayna Kopec's door.

"Come in, Sam."

He stepped inside, instantly noticing the look of irritation on her face.

"How did you know it was me?"

"I recognized your knock." She smiled at him and then nodded at two identical blue leather covered cases. "Look what arrived early this morning."

He crossed the room and picked up one of the two matching square cases. Opening the lid, he revealed a circular bronze disk nestling amongst a pale blue silk lining. Carefully removing the medal, he brushed a thumb over the raised image of an eagle's head and a single word: Valor.

"Is this some sort of joke?" he growled angrily.

"The Intelligence Medal of Merit." She looked him straight in the eye. "Given for the performance of especially meritorious service or for an act or achievement conspicuously above normal duties which has contributed significantly to the mission of the Agency."

Sam carefully returned the medal to its box and closed the lid with a snap. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have suggested - "

She was on her feet and standing in front of him, her hand ghosting over his cheek. "It's not your fault. This is all Jamieson and Sizemore. But I promise you, they'll pay."

**()**

Michael Westen stared at the stack of files that had just been delivered to his room by Station Chief Kopec's latest pup. The young agent had dropped the stack down on to his table and announced, "Agent Meyers notes and Recruit Chen's 201 from Langley," before turning away and leaving without another word.

He reached out and slid the 201 from the pile. This was his recruit's personnel file. He grinned.

_His recruit. _He liked the sound of that. Pausing for a moment to stare at the plain grey cover, he took a deep breath and opened it.

He read the recruit's full name and then stared at the photograph clipped to the first page. _Not what he was expecting_. He slammed the folder shut and pushed it away. _No, definitely not what he was expecting_. The old feelings of distrust began to rise up yet again. _What were they thinking? What the hell could he teach a female agent?_

Crossing his arms over his chest, he found he couldn't take his eyes off the folder. It was a joke, it had to be a joke. _He was Michael Westen, the scourge of Soviet intelligence. He was not a god-damned babysitter._

Ten minutes later, he was still staring at the folder. Station Chief Kopec wasn't known for her sense of humor. So the chances of the placement of Agent Lucy Chen as his trainee being an error or a nasty joke to test his resolve was very slim indeed.

With an angry huff, he snatched the folder up again and opened the cover for a second time. She looked twelve years old. He studied the photograph. Shoulder length straight black hair framed a pretty if very young face. He narrowed his eyes. A_re those freckles? How the hell is this going to work? She's a damn kid with freckles_.

Unable to look at the photograph any longer, he turned his attention to the written details. Maybe things weren't as bad as he first thought. Lucy Chen, 22 year old Chinese American, was fluent in both Russian, and Mandarin. She also had a degree in political science plus two black belts in Karate and Judo. _So far so good_.

He scanned down through the information. She had scored well in unarmed combat, the black belts would have helped with that. Her scores with small arms and with a rifle were not up to his own standards, but they weren't too shabby either. _If only she wasn't - well, if she was a he, it would be a hell of a lot better._

Closing the folder he lay back against the pillows. _It was no good. He couldn't see anyway of making it work. Nothing was going to change the fact that Agent Lucy Chen was a woman and women didn't belong in the field. They were too easily fooled._

_He had lost count of how many women he had sweet talked over the years. Smile, show them a bit of attention, make out like you care, it was all so easy. He had witnessed his dad pull the same ploy on his mother time and time again. Hell, the old man could beat her so bad she couldn't stand, but he'd come home a few hours later with some flowers and an apology and she'd forgive him just like that. But it wasn't only his dad, he'd seen it happen within his friends' families too._

His time in the Rangers hadn't changed his point of view one iota. In fact, it had been drilled into his head that women had no place on the battlefield and, since being with Larry, the older man had just confirmed everything he already believed. The only anomaly as far as he was concerned was Rayna Kopec. He didn't know any other women who could take on a well trained man in unarmed combat and win or single-handedly rescue a comrade from an enemy camp.

Letting out a long disgruntled sigh, he pushed the table away. What he needed was some fresh air. He always thought better when he was on his feet. He hadn't been officially cleared to get out of bed, but the I.V lines were gone. So, there was nothing keeping him immobile. Besides, if they really wanted him to stay in bed, shouldn't they have made it an order?

Carefully he eased himself over to the edge so that his feet dangled inches off the floor. He stared down at his bare legs realizing that all he had on was a hospital gown. _Okay, so maybe he wouldn't venture out of his room quite yet._

Inching forward, he placed his feet flat on the floor. He couldn't believe how skinny his legs had become. Taking a deep breath, he rose up onto his feet and stood upright. He felt a bit light headed and the backs of his legs hurt - a lot. But nothing he couldn't handle. He was out of bed and he was going to show them he didn't need to wait for a doctor to tell him he was fine.

Smiling, he took one step away from the bed and the next thing he felt was the smack of his head onto the hard linoleum covered floor. He lay stunned by what had just happened and then, as he tried to get back to his feet, a wave of nausea caused him to collapse back onto the floor.

He was stuck laying face down on the floor to his room, his head was pounding away, not just from his original head wound, but also from the newly acquired lump on his forehead. Every effort he made to get up caused more pain to shoot through his body. He heard footsteps outside in the corridor, but he didn't shout out. If he was found like this, they'd never let him out of bed again.

_Westen men did not faint and highly trained covert operatives did not call out for help because they fell out of bed. _He made one more effort to get on to his hands and knees, unable to stifle a groan when he collapsed and the door to his room opened.

"Jeez, Mike! What the hell were you thinking? You okay, buddy?"

_Sam Axe, it had to be Sam Axe._

Michael looked up, first catching sight of a set of laced boots, black pants and then as he followed the clothing upwards, he found himself staring at the SEAL.

"Yeah, well, I thought I was getting better," he muttered, a faint blush coloring his cheeks at being unable to get himself up off the floor.

"And what gave you the idea you was ready to go for a walk?" Sam raised an eyebrow at the young agent. Reaching the bed, he pressed on the call button.

"I wanted to get some air." Michael pulled a face when he noticed Sam had buzzed for help. "Can't you just give me a hand, get me back in bed without letting them know?"

"Sorry, Mike, you might have hurt yourself," Sam consoled. He sat down on the edge of the bed while they waited for help to arrive.

It wasn't a long wait and as soon as the on call doctor and nurses arrived, he stood clear to let them work on getting Michael back into bed.

"Agent Westen, you're lucky you've not done any more damage to yourself. Now, until you receive authorization, stay in bed or I will bring out the restraints," the duty doctor ordered sternly before pulling up the side rails and locking them in place.

Once they were alone and he was trapped back in the bed, being treated like a child, Michael turned his scowling countenance onto the smiling Navy SEAL.

"What do you want now, Sam?" he grumbled.

"I came to tell you the medals arrived this morning and that your boss is planning on handing them out tomorrow and then she wants you and Sizemore separated as soon as possible. Are you ready to do this?"

"Do I have any choice?" Michael muttered darkly, gently probing at the fresh lump to his head and wincing.

"No, not really," Sam agreed. "But you'll have to keep your cool in there and smile."

"I can do that. I told you you can trust me."

"You just don't look too happy about it, that's all, Mikey."

"Happy?" Michael scowled, grimacing as he reached across to pick up one of the folders on his table. "Have you seen this?" He thrust the file into Sam's hands.

Michael watched as Sam flicked through the details inside the folder. After a few minutes, the older man looked over at him, his expression both mild and amused.

"So, this is what's up with you? I thought you'd be pleased, a nice young female trainee hanging off your every word. Most men wouldn't be scowling like you are at the moment."

"Why should I waste my time training some little girl who is going to spend the whole of her career working honey traps or body guarding some influential diplomat," Michael sneered back.

"Is that what you really think? What about your boss, Ms. Kopec? I mean, she's a woman _and_ your boss. Do you think she just walked into the job as a station chief? You've worked with her in the field. Does she strike you as a honey trap?"

_Kopec! Was Sam serious? _Michael gulped and swallowed thickly as a very unsettling image flashed before his eyes.

_"Yeah, good ol' Sam Axe, him and the Ice Queen are getting very cozy."_

He forced the thought of the pair of them together out of his head and, to cover his discomfort, he leaned forward and jabbed at the photograph.

"Rayna Kopec doesn't look like that," he stated firmly.

"No, I admit Agent Chen does not look like your boss. But look at this, she ran the New York marathon in '92 and she's got a degree in business studies." He turned to another page. "An' here, she's not in your league, but let's face it, she hasn't been to Ranger School. But have you checked out her scores on the range? If this girl doesn't make it as a successful field agent, you really will have failed badly."

Michael gave a small smile. "And I'm not allowed to fail, am I? Because if I want to get back out in the field, I've gotta turn this rookie into a useful asset for the Company and straighten myself out at the same time, don't I?"

"See, now you've got it," Sam smiled. "It's nothing you can't do. The girl has talent and if you stop looking for the quickest and easiest way out, regardless of collateral damage-"

"It's not all we did," Michael snapped.

"What?" Sam frowned at the sudden change in Michael's demeanour.

"Shooting, killing, it's not all we did... We did a lot of good. We saved a lotta lives." He knew it was irrational, but for some reason it was important to him that Sam didn't think he was just a killer.

"I know that, Mikey," Sam replied softly. "But, well, it's mostly the other stuff people remember and that's the stuff you can't do any more. You've gotta start thinking about other ways of accomplishing your goals."

The anger left as fast as it came and Michael slumped back in his bed, holding his hand out for the folder. Taking it back, Michael opened in and studied the medical report.

"She's gotta broken arm," he commented. "It looks like she's gonna be ready for work before I am."

"You've got four weeks, Mike. You'll be on your feet by then. Besides, you start her off on some surveillance work, maybe get her tailing you round DC or Langley."

"Maybe I'll show her how to get into a foreign embassy with just a winning smile." He flashed his teeth in a wide grin. "Or how to plant a listening device in the assistant director of the CIA's office phone."

It was Sam's turn to gulp as he thought about what they would soon be unleashing back home in the U.S.

"All good ideas, Mikey. But how about starting the young lady off by sticking to the official programme?"

**()**

"Agent Sizemore, when I heard about your progress, I had to come down and see for myself," Rayna Kopec called out as she crossed the floor of the weights room.

Larry glanced up, but continued with his workout. "I'm sure you did, sweetheart," he grunted. Releasing the weights, he slowly raised himself into a sitting position.

The Station Chief crossed her arms over her chest and she continued to stare at the older man, his words on the recording still fresh in her mind.

_"Once we're both in the clear and we have those awards, I think the Ice Queen will have finally outlived her usefulness."_

She hid her distaste behind a neutral expression. "I came to inform you the commendations arrived from Langley and I've set the ceremony for tomorrow at mid-day. I've also arranged for your transfer to the U.N base on Cyprus."

She couldn't help a small smile at the look of surprise on his face. "It'll make it so much easier for you to keep up to date with the Yemen situation."

She watched the play of emotions on his face. He was good, but he couldn't completely hide his anger. He wiped away the sweat beading on his forehead before making eye contact.

"The medals arrived today?" he ground out the words from behind clenched teeth.

"Yes, you should thank Senator Jamieson, for that," she answered lightly. "It seems that over the years you and Westen managed to make quite an impression on the good Senator and he was very eager to reward your good work."

Larry blinked rapidly several times. "It's nice to be appreciated," he grunted as he got to his feet.

Leaning on the walking frame, he deliberately moved the metal legs so she had to back up or get her toes squashed.

"Now shouldn't you be off writing up a nice little speech about our top notch work for the Company, Honey? Cuz I've got things to do."

She pursed her lips as she watched him limp heavily across the room and out through the swing doors. So he hadn't known Jamieson had already approved and sent the medals. _That was very interesting_.

**()**

Larry reached his room and with a snarl sent the walking frame across the room. _What the hell was Jamieson playing at sending the medals out so soon? _He glanced down at where his slippers lay under his bed. All his carefully laid plans were going to have to be moved up now. _The Ice Queen, and The Boy Scout, and now the goddamn Head of the Intelligence Oversight Committee if he ever tried thinking for himself again._

With a great deal of effort, Larry staggered over to his bed and sat down heavily. He glanced at his slippers again. Those pills weren't going to cut it any more. _I'm going to need to get into the pharmacy. I need something more - exotic that's not going to show on a tox screen._

Easing himself flat on the bed, he closed his eyes and started to plot.


	14. Chapter 14

**SAVIOR.**

**A/N: So here it is the final chapter of this story. I'd like to say a massive thanks to Jedi Skysinger for all the help she has given me. Savior would not have been the same without her being there to bounce ideas off and help with research. Also of course for her OC Rayna Kopec, who played such a major part in Saving Michael Westen and of course the super BETAing of every chapter.**

**I'd also like to thank everybody who has reviewed, put on alerts or favorited Savior and those of you who have sent me Pms regarding this whole tale.**

**Lastly and by no means least a big shout out to Amanda Hawthorn, and Daisyday for making me laugh and smile everyday.**

**Part Fourteen,**

Larry Sizemore laid back on his bed with his eyes closed, letting the rhythmic thud of his heartbeat soothe away his anger. All his carefully laid out plans were in ruins.

Oh, he had all the necessary skills to gain access to the hospital pharmacy, but he needed time to build up his strength. Time that an over eager politician had stolen from him. But he was a professional. When one door closed, another invariably opened. He just had to find the right door.

The anger slowly slipped away and the corners of his lips curved into a smile at the sudden thought of all the sharp implements he could get his hands on. With the pharmacy out of bounds for now maybe he could take advantage of another form of attack.

Gosh, he loved hospitals, so many wonderful opportunities. But while thinking about either method of assassination should have lightened his mood, he knew that a cleansing rash of heart attacks or a series of slit throats would bring too much unwanted attention his way.

_Damn Jamieson for trying to think for himself, and damn that bitch Kopec for -_

His eyes snapped open and a curse ripped from between his tightly clenched lips. _Idiot! _He sat upright, cursing again when he pulled at his stitches. _Amateur! _When he had entered his room, he had been so furious at Jamieson for messing up his carefully laid out plans that in his rage he had missed a few very interesting changes to his room.

Hanging up on the outside of his closet was a cheap black suit jacket and a white cotton shirt. Underneath folded neatly on a chair was the matching suit pants and a set of underwear. The clothes alerted him to the fact that somebody from the Company had been in his room and he had a very good idea who it had been.

_Kopec, the BITCH had been in his room!_

From his position sitting up on the bed, he scanned the room with a professional eye. The positioning of his belongings at first glance looked exactly as he had left them, but searching rooms was part of his job description and he knew when somebody had done it to him. Now that he was alert, he could see there were tiny clues all about the room that only somebody with training would notice.

His eyes fell to where his slippers lay on the floor, the toes just peeking out from under the bed. Grunting from the effort, he reached down and picked them up. Examining the stitching and feeling around with his sensitive fingers, he allowed himself a small smile of relief. Maybe Kopec wasn't as smart as she thought she was.

That feeling didn't last long. He had survived so long in a business with a higher than average mortality rate because of his highly developed sense of self preservation and paranoia. He let the slippers drop back to the floor and turned his attention to his phone and the electrical outlet beside the bed. He ran through his meeting with his boss, picking through her little speech looking for clues to her real meaning.

_"I came to inform you the commendations arrived from Langley and I've set the ceremony for tomorrow mid-day."_

_"You should thank Senator Jamieson. He was very eager to reward your good work."_

With a growl, he lifted up the handset and unscrewed the mouthpiece. Moving the microphone to the side, he found a second tiny microphone hidden inside amongst the other wires. Screwing the bits of plastic back together, he put it back on the base.

She had expected him to call Jamieson, so she must know or at least be suspicious of their relationship. He bit on his lower lip. This was even more reason to send the little woman to an early grave, but first he was going to have to find out how much she knew and who she had told.

Picking up his slippers for a second time, he unpicked the lining and dug out the pills. With a sigh, he got up and hobbled to the bathroom attached to his room. Inside he took one last lingering look at the pills before flushing them down the toilet. If he was going to spend some quiet time questioning Kopec, it was going to have to wait until he was fit enough to grab her.

He picked up his walking frame and used it to aid himself back to the bed. Slumping back down on the covers, another thought struck him. He could use the time to come up with some suitable accident for Sammy the seal, too.

()()

"Here we go, Mikey." Sam breezed into the young spy's hospital room.

"Hey - Sam. That for me?" The younger man eyed the collection of clothing in Sam's arms.

"Yep," He held up a hanger holding a black single breasted jacket over the top of a white shirt. "Your boss asked me to bring your clothes over to you for tomorrow. The ceremony is set for mid-day and our flight out leaves at thirteen hundred, so you won't have to hang around Sizemore for too long."

Sam paused as he carefully hung the jacket and shirt on the out of use I.V stand and then lay the freshly pressed matching black pants over the back of a nearby chair, leaving the rest of Michael's clothing on the seat. "This time tomorrow we'll on our way back to the U.S."

Michael eyed the clothing unhappily. It was all happening too fast for his liking and left him feeling completely out of control of his own life. Angrily he jerked at the bed rails which were still fixed in place, adding to his feeling of being trapped.

"You okay, Mike? I mean, we've talked about this and you said you were fine with Ms. Kopec's orders."

"No - I mean - yeah, I'm fine." He sent Sam a half-hearted glance, but couldn't build up any enthusiasm for any more talking.

Instead he went back to staring over at the suit. Even from across the room it was possible to pick out it was a cheap off the rack item. Nothing like the made-to-measure designer labels he had become accustomed to since working with Larry.

_Designer suits, expensive haircuts, manicured nails. International men of mystery, Larry's favorite cover._

He realized he was zoning out when Sam Axe slapped his hands down on the raised bed rail, making the steel bar rattle loudly. "Look I'm gonna leave you to get some sleep. I just wanted to keep you up to date with Ms. Kopec's plans. She's set the time of the ceremony for mid-day. She's gonna give a little speech and hand over the medals. You smile for the photographs and then I'll come and get you. We'll be wheels up by thirteen hundred hours. It'll be easy peasy, Mike, and, if you don't want to talk to Larry, just keep your mouth shut and look like you're in a lotta pain."

Sam Axe made it sound all so easy, but to him it felt like he was breaking a trust. He had worked with Larry for three years and it hadn't all been bad. He had learned a lot from the older far more experienced spy and not just how to kill.

"Okay, Mike," Sam spoke up again when Michael failed to respond. "Get some sleep, buddy, and try not to think too much about it, huh?"

"Sure." Michael managed a slight smile. "I'll try not to think about it..." His eyes strayed back to the cheap suit. "Thanks for the clothes."

"Not a problem. It was all bought on the CIAs dime." He headed for the door, glancing down at his wristwatch on the way out. "I'll see ya tomorrow, Kid."

Michael waited until Sam left the room and then fell back with a sigh. _"See ya tomorrow, Kid." _He wondered if he was ever going to stop being thought of as a kid.

Shifting in the bed he tried to find a comfortable position. 'Get some sleep' sounded like a simple piece of advice, but his head was filled with so many random thoughts and emotions, he couldn't relax. Did he really want to end his partnership with Larry? He couldn't get it out of his head, they were a good team; everybody said so. Was he just being soft? _Saint Michael._

He gasped as, out of nowhere, he was flooded with the images, smells and even the sounds from that Chechen farmhouse. He was back there again, hiding the evidence of Larry's crime. His hands were covered in the blood of a whole family, most of them innocent women and children. He gulped and swallowed, trying to remove the bitter taste of gunpowder and death that had pervaded his mouth and nose. He had helped destroy all the evidence of their crime and, in just over twelve hours, he was going to have to accept an award for his actions.

He lay back trembling. He wasn't sure he could go ahead with the ceremony, at least not without shooting Larry. Scrubbing at his face, he forced the image of dead children and elderly women from his head. Sure, this was the worse thing he had ever covered up, but it was by no means the first.

_He had been six years old sitting in the back seat of his dad's brand new Dodge Charger with tears running down his face, mixing with the snot pouring out of his nose. In the front seat with one hand on the steering wheel while the other held a cigarette, his mother weaved the large muscle car through the heavy afternoon traffic going as fast as she dared towards the nearest emergency room. Every time the car jerked to a stop or was swung across the street to avoid another vehicle or obstacle in the road, he had cried out and cuddled his dislocated elbow even closer to his body._

_As he cried out, Madeline had worriedly glanced back at him. "Mikey, honey, try an' keep still. You don't want to make your Dad mad again, do you? It's gonna be a nightmare keeping them seats clean. Why did he have to get white leather? I don't know what goes through that man's head sometimes."_

_She had continued on in that light until she found a parking space half a block from the hospital entrance. Then holding on to his good arm, she had hurried him along the street towards the doors to the ER._

_"Not long now, honey, an' you'll be feeling all better. Can you remember what to say to the doctors if they ask?"_

_"Daddy hurt my arm," he sobbed._

_"NO! No, you can't say that. You'll get Daddy in trouble and that will make me cry. You don't want to make your Mommy cry now do you?"_

_"No, but -"_

_"No buts, Mikey. You fell and hurt your arm and banged your head on the floor."_

_"But-"_

_"Do as I say, Mikey. Your Daddy's very sorry about what happened. You be a good boy now and don't make him angry by telling tales." She had stopped and faced him, her watery blue eyes locked on him. "Michael," she spoke slowly, her voice flat and cold. "If you tell them your Dad did this, they'll take you and the baby growing in Mommy's tummy away an' put you both in a bad place. You want that? You want to be taken away?"_

_He remembered his fear and how he had gulped. All the while his eyes fixed on Madeline's expanding belly and he promised in a low whisper that he would tell the doctors and anybody else who asked that he had fallen._

_They sat in the emergency room for over four hours amongst the drunks and drug addicts and victims of crimes and fights before they were called through to a small cubicle separated from the next by a thin curtain. He sat miserably on the bed while a doctor looked at his arm and asked him lots of questions. He remembered how he hadn't liked the way the doctor had kept looking at his Mom._

_From the doctor he was sent for an x ray and then to another room, where they sat in yet another line. He noticed the looks they were receiving from some of the nurses. He heard one of the women mutter something about "It's the third time that kid's been in here in six months and it's looks like she's got another on the way."_

_They had been on their way out of the door when they were stopped by a tired looking middle aged woman with a careworn expression._

_"Mrs Westen? I need to ask Michael some questions about what happened to his arm today. Can you come this way?"_

_His Mom had looked around as if she was about to bolt, but they were already being directed towards a side room by a large unfriendly looking orderly._

_They were left in the small stuffy room for what felt hours. His left arm, covered by an elastic bandage and held tightly against his body in a sling, had stopped hurting but the large bruise on his cheek was making his head thump with a blinding headache. A headache which was made worse by his Mom kneeling in front of him with tears running down her cheeks. He remembered he thought she looked like a clown as her heavy make up streaked her face. But what she had said to him had been anything but funny._

_She had stared up at him her bottom lip quivering and her eyes rapidly blinking away the tears that still trickled from her eyes. "Mikey, it's real important you listen to me. In a little while somebody is going to come in and want to talk to you. They're gonna to ask you about what happened to your arm. Do you remember what Mommy told you an' the doctors?"_

_He had nodded solemnly and sniffed away a threaten sob._

_"Tell me, Mikey. Tell Mommy what you're going to tell that old busybody when she comes back in."_

_He had thought briefly of telling the truth, telling the lady from DCF that his Dad had grabbed him by the arm and twisted it so hard behind his back that his elbow had popped out and then when he had yelled and cried out, his Daddy had slapped him round the head and told him to 'shut the hell up'._

_But, even at the age of six, he knew it would do no good. People coming around asking questions only made his Dad madder than usual. It was better to do as his Mom wanted, better for both of them._

_"I fell over the step. I fell over the step and landed on my arm and banged my head," he had answered, the tired looking woman's questions._

The realization hit like a bolt of lightning. If he could lie at six years old before an inquisition of social workers, he could do what he had to now. Back then, that first lie had meant he was stuck living with a monster for another eleven years.

This time he had lied to cover up for an altogether different kind of monster but he had been offered a reprieve, a single chance to redeem himself and he knew he had to take it or the consequences were going to be far worse than living under the same roof as Frank Westen.

Remembering that incident cleared away his doubts. He would do whatever was necessary to get out from under Larry Sizemore's influence. He would accept the medal and he would smile. After all, they were getting the commendations for discovering Josef Broshev was a traitor to his government and in doing so had aided the Chechen cause and saved a lot of lives.

With a sigh, he finally let his eyes slid shut. They had done a good thing, they had saved lives, Broshev had been a traitor.

()()

Out in the hallway, Sam glanced at his watch yet again. Running his tongue over his lips, he gauged how long it would take him to drive the short distance to Adana; it was already close to midnight. Why had she left it so late before handing him Mike's suit for the ceremony? Had she done it deliberately?

He knew all about her concerns, her latest promotion had given her a high profile position in an area primed for a civil war and now Larry Sizemore was threatening everything she had worked so hard for.

He remembered the previous nights dinner, it had mostly been a working meal to discuss Michael Westen's progress as a human being and Larry Sizemore's direct threat to the Station chief's life. Until she had turned it on to more personal matters.

"You know how important my career is to me and this promotion... Well, it's the best thing that's happened to me." She had started the conversation and he had instantly known where it was going and he understood completely. But that didn't stop him wanting to wring Larry Sizemore's neck.

Instead he had raised an eyebrow and given her a crooked grin before asking. "Better than our first meeting?"

"I believe I threw your drunken ass out onto the pavement and you -"

"I asked you for a date," he had finished the tale. "You could have had more than a career if that's what you'd wanted, Sandy," he'd added gently.

It had been her turn then to cock an eyebrow. "Really, Sam? I didn't think you would ever be ready to scrub that budweiser off your arm."

He remembered how he had paled at the thought of settling down. But before he could come up with a reply, she had laughed at him and shook her head.

"It's o-kay Sam, calm down, we're both professionals here. You gave me the push I needed to turn my life around and do something good, and what I'm doing now is all I want to do. I mean, I know it can be a pain in the ass sometimes, especially when I'm stuck dealing with guys like Sizemore and Jamieson. But this job gives me the satisfaction of knowing I'm saving lives and helping my country every day." She had shrugged then and just for the briefest second, her fingers had brushed over his hand. "I'm sorry, Sam, but while I'm on Larry's radar we have to cool things down. I can't take any risks."

Was that the reason for the late night request to take Westen his suit for the following day? Giving her the chance to cut and run? He reached the hospital entrance with his head bowed. This was their last night in Incirlik and he had hoped that they would spend it together.

Exiting the hospital he found his way barred by a young Airman. "Lieutenant Commander Axe, Sir?"

He straightened up and answered the young Airman's salute with one of his own and then stared at the keys he was being offered.

"Your keys, Sir."

It was then he spotted a black sedan car with military plates parked nearby. Sam's face broke into a small smile and within seconds he was driving along the winding roads into Adana.

Arriving outside Rayna Kopec's hotel room, Sam paused to straighten up his crumpled fatigues. He scrubbed his hands over his cheeks feeling the thick stubble. He should have shaved and showered before rushing over like some teenager on a first date. Still, it was too late now. Raising his hand, he knocked lightly on the wooden door.

He moved back a step as he heard the lock being released and then she was stood before him, her hair still damp from the shower and only a towel wrapped around her body for modesty.

"Come on in," she invited, backing slowly away from him a taunting smile gracing her features.

She wasn't a classic beauty, her features lacked the necessary delicacy for that. But whenever she smiled at him in that way, he knew he was lost. It wouldn't have mattered if Miss World had come into the room at that moment. The dirty blonde with cool blue eyes and the killer smile had his whole undivided attention.

He wasn't aware of locking the door. The only thing that mattered was that he kept Rayna Kopec in view as she was now in his sight. There was really no words needed between them. This was their ritual and he felt guilty that he had doubted her earlier.

He entered the bedroom to find her sitting in front of the dressing table, staring at her image in the mirror. He stood behind her, his hands dropping lightly onto her bare shoulders. Leaning over he kissed her damp skin, letting his lips trail from behind her ear down to her clavicle.

"I thought you had forgotten me." She had tilted her head to the side to give him better access to her throat.

"Not a chance, baby." he growled into her ear. "How could I forget our Office Candidate School graduation night?"

His hands slid lower loosening the towel while his soft breath caressed her neck. "Or after that nasty business in Italy?"

The towel fell away. pooling on the floor in front of his feet. Her head rested back against his hips as he leaned over her, his fingertips lightly ghosting over her flesh.

"Don't forget, Venice. I liked Venice - it was our - first joint assignment." Her breath hitched in her throat as his touch increased in pressure.

But it was not enough for her. She had had enough of his slow gentle teasing exploration of her body. Twisting around she got to her feet. The chair was in their way now, so she backed him away all the while her hands worked on his clothing. "Of course, Afghanistan was unusual. You showed a great deal of inventiveness that night."

His belt slid through the loops of his pants landing on the floor with a soft thud. "But for pure, unadulterated cunning," his pants were now undone and hanging low on his hips. "I would have to say," her supple fingers made quick work of his shirt buttons and it too joined the belt on the floor. "The Honeymoon Suite at the Ritz Carlton in DC."

One light push and his legs hit the edge of the bed and he was flat on his back. She looked down at him, her eyes drinking in the outline of his muscled chest, the defined ridges of his abs and the slimness of his hips. This was their ritual. They knew they could never be together as a traditional couple, but they could have this; whatever it was. A final night together until the next time.

()()

Rayna was awoken by the early morning sun entering her bedroom window. With a soft groan she rolled over, her hand reaching out across the bed but finding only cold sheets. With a sigh, she opened her eyes. She had known he would be gone. He was always the first to leave. He would have watched her fall asleep and then stolen away.

He hadn't stayed because there were no words left to be said. She was due at a conference in two days time and he, well he was off babysitting a young CIA agent who was suffering a crisis of conscience. The thought brought a smile to her lips. This was the first time in a very long time that she knew exactly where he was going when he left her.

Glancing over at her alarm clock she saw it was five fifteen. She had managed only a couple of hours sleep. She considered wrapping herself back up in the bed covers and sleeping in until seven, but instead she swung her legs out of bed and reached for the phone. She would order room service and, while she waited for her breakfast, to arrive she would take another shower.

An hour and a half later, Rayna Kopec, CIA Station Chief for the South-Western region of Russia, stood in front of the full length mirror attached to the door of her hotel closet. The suit she wore was immaculate, a dark grey fitted jacket over a crisp white blouse and a matching dark grey skirt that ended at her knees. Light brown tights and two inch high black court shoes finished her outfit.

Pursing her lips, she checked out her appearance with a critical eye. Even though the ceremony to 'honor' Larry Sizemore and Michael Westen was nothing but a sham as far as she was concerned, it was still an official CIA function and she would treat it as such.

Satisfied that her skirt suit was crinkle free, she began to brush out her shoulder length hair. As she worked the brush through her thick hair and then pinned it all into a smart up do, she ran through her carefully worded speech in her head.

She winced as she accidentally stabbed herself in the scalp at the thought of the honor that was being bestowed on two men who she thought should be rotting away in the deepest hole she could find. With the hairpin repositioned, Rayna checked out her reflection and smoothed down the front of her clothes.

Turning away from the mirror, she slipped the hairbrush into her purse and then pulled her small flight case off the bed. For a moment, she let her CIA persona slip as her eyes lingered on the rumpled sheets and pillows, but it was only for a moment and then she was back into CIA mode.

Turning away from the bed, she did a final visual sweep of the room before walking out of the door and heading for the elevators. Once inside the metal box she pressed the button that would take her down to the reception. As the door's slid shut and the elevator began to move, she let out a long sigh.

_It was going to be a very long day._

()()

Michael Westen gritted his teeth and tried for the fourth time to button up his shirt, but each time his fingers refused to cooperate. Several were broken and taped together which he could understand made things difficult. But it didn't explain why he was having problems with the rest of his digits.

"The blow to your head, the infection or even the medication we've given you could all be the cause for the lack of fine motor control, Agent Westen. When you get back home and have completed a course of physio therapy I'm confident you'll see some improvement," The duty doctor had tried to explain to the impatient young agent.

But he wanted to be independent. He was sick of being trapped and ordered around and he was definitely sick of having no say in his future. He was a grown man he could dress himself.

It was only when Agent Benson had turned up to escort him to the ceremony and he still wasn't dressed, he had finally conceded defeat and allowed one of the nurses to help him get ready. As soon as he was dressed, he was aided into the waiting wheelchair and rushed out of the hospital and over to the main building.

"It's five minutes after twelve," Agent Benson scowled as they entered the conference room.

"Don't worry about it, kid," Michael had smiled. "The - Ms. Kopec won't start without me."

It was nearly over. In an hour, he would be on a flight out of Turkey and on his way to the East coast of the U.S.A. He just had to get through this ceremony.

His eyes flickered over to where Larry sat looking totally at ease, the older man actually raised a hand in greeting and smirked. Luckily as soon as the Station Chief spotted him, she rapped on the nearby table.

"Gentlemen, I'd like to get this over with as quickly as possible," she announced in a clear voice.

Instantly, the small gathering of intelligence officers moved into place. Michael found himself positioned at the head table along with the Station Chief and Larry Sizemore.

"Listen up, Kid," Larry smirked. "This should be good."

Michael had no intention of listening to Rayna Kopec ruin his tentative grip on his sanity. He didn't want the medal. They hadn't done anything medal-worthy, they had just been doing their job. They stopped Josef Broshev who had been a traitor to his own people. Their intelligence gathering skills may not have made the area any safer, but he was convinced they had saved some lives. But that was all.

_"It's called wet work for a reason."_

Michael blinked and glanced over to Larry, who looked to be enjoying himself immensely. Rayna Kopec was now talking about the noble purpose that all covert agents served.

_"If you think about it, you would have killed them all yourself. I just saved you the trouble."_

He swallowed and pushed back the feeling of nausea that was rising from his gut. He had done nothing. Josef Broshev had been a traitor.

"Agent Westen?"

Michael flinched and looked up. Rayna Kopec faced him holding the blue case which contained the medal. "Yes, Ma'am." He tried to keep the tremor out of his voice.

"You are awarded the Intelligence Medal of Merit for your hard work and actions which have been judged to far surpass what would be considered your normal duties."

She thrust the case into his hand and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Smile at the camera, Westen," she ordered through her own toothy grin.

Trying not to squint, Michael obeyed the command as a flash went off several times. As soon as the photographer moved away, he risked making eye contact with his boss and then speaking in a low voice. "I want to say thank you for -"

She fixed him with a steely stare which made him feel like a five year old. "You've nothing to thank me for, Westen. Just see you do something to warrant that award in the future."

Then she was gone, leaving him sitting alone, or rather with Larry Sizemore.

He remained hunched forward in his wheelchair as the few members of CIA staff who had been present filed out of the conference room and he kept his head down as Rayna Kopec walked past and out through the door. He wasn't going to forget her stony expression boring into him as she spoke those final words to him.

"Ha! Did ya see the Ice Queen's face when she had to hand out the commendations?" Larry's loud mocking tone made him look up. The older man was on his feet rocking back on his heels, while his hands firmly gripped the steel walking frame. "I thought the bitch was going to be sick," he continued to crow, his blue eyes sparkling with glee. "And what about that whole damn speech? I was waiting for her to start choking on the words."

Michael dropped his gaze and sucked in a deep breath. _Where the hell was Sam Axe?_

"Hey, Kid! Stop sulking," Larry was still on a high. "I worked my ass off to get you that goddamn medal so cheer up, huh?" But if there was one thing Larry couldn't stand, it was ungratefulness, Michael saw the first signs that his ex-mentor's good mood was fading.

In an effort to keep Larry from digging to deeply into why he was being so quiet, Michael offered up a wide toothy smile of his own.

"Sorry," he replied. "I guess I didn't really think you'd pull it off, Lare."

"Yeah, well, you should know by now if I say I'm gonna do something, it gets done." He hobbled closer. "So are you going to tell me what's up with you? We're in the clear, I gotta promotion and pretty soon we'll be set up in the Middle East. I'll be able to use this Yemen assignment to make some fresh contacts and you can barely crack a smile."

The click of the door being opened made both men turn their heads. They watched in silence as a blank faced Sam Axe marched stiffly into the room. "Okay, Westen, the jet is waiting on the tarmac, so it's time to get going."

Before Sam could reach the wheel chair, Larry's mocking tones broke the silence.

"Well, hey there, Sam. I didn't think you'd be up and around. The Station Chief was looking a bit bow-legged earlier on, so I thought you must be taking a - "

"Shut the hell up, Lare," Sam snapped, turning to face Larry whose smirk had become a knowing leer.

Michael opened his mouth as if to speak but he couldn't think of anything to say. He knew exactly what was going through Larry's mind and knew anything he added would only fan the flames of the confrontation.

"Shut up, wow! Is that the best you can come up with? I'd be more careful with my words if I wuz you, Sammy. There's no little woman around to protect you this time."

"Sorry, Mikey," Sam growled before taking two swift steps in Larry's direction.

"Ohhh," Larry laughed. "So the boy scout's balls haven't been frozen off."

Michael winced knowing he had no hope of stopping the bloodbath about to take place. All he could do was watch helplessly as Sam knocked the walking frame to one side and grabbed Larry by the collar of his white shirt before throwing him back against the wall.

"I've had enough of your smart assed comments, you blood sucking ghoul." Sam closed in until they were nose to nose.

"So you want to try an' - " Larry didn't finish his speech because while he distracted Sam by talking, he brought his good arm up and delivered a roundhouse blow to Sam's jaw, knocking the younger man backwards.

Larry stood up and straightened his tie, all the while his eyes fixed on his opponent. "Hah, what have I always said, Kid? Navy SEALs are nothin' but a bunch of …..Ooooffff." The air left his lungs as Sam moved far faster then either of the spies thought he could planting a fist deep into Larry's gut.

"You open your mouth one more time and I swear I'll break your jaw." Sam drew himself up and started to turn away.

Michael's lips parted to give a warning, but no words came out. Surely Sam couldn't be so naïve that he thought he could turn his back on somebody like Larry Sizemore. Larry's hand came out of his jacket pocket and Michael caught sight of a flash of steel. The older spy had managed to get hold of a scalpel.

"S -" Michael got no further in his warning. Instead his mouth fell open as Sam suddenly spun and his foot lashed out connecting with Larry's hand and sending the scalpel flying across the room. The young man remained mute as he witnessed Sam Axe drag Larry upright by his tie.

For a second the two men were eye to eye. Michael watched spellbound as Sam leaned in and spoke into Larry's ear. He watched as his old mentor's eyes widened and then, with a final shove against the wall, Sam let Larry go and stepped back.

"You think you can threaten me? You're a damn wet nurse, Axe. A stinking boy scout who - "

The punch was a work of artistry, an uppercut which slammed under Larry's chin and effectively closed his mouth. From the crunching sound, he was going to need some dental work once he came back around. Both Sam and Michael watched as Larry crumpled slowly to the floor knocked out cold.

"I told you, you sick sonuvabitch, the next time I saw you I'd put you on your ass."

Sam calmly turned to where the scalpel lay and picked it up, turning it over in his hand. He then turned to face Michael who had watched the whole fight barely uttering a word and was now staring in shock at his fallen partner.

"You ready to go, Mikey?" Sam spoke jovially as if nothing had happened.

Michael looked from Larry to Sam, then back to Larry, before finally settling back in the chair.

"Yeah, let's go," he answered flatly, turning his head away from Larry and he didn't look back as they left the room.

()()

They were crossing the tarmac to where a large passenger aircraft sat awaiting their arrival.

"You know when Larry wakes up, he's gonna come after you looking for payback."

Michael tried to turn his head to get a look at the man who had just laid Larry Sizemore out flat on the floor.

"Better me than somebody else," Sam answered without breaking stride.

Michael bit down on his bottom lip as he wondered if Sam really knew how dangerous a situation he had put himself in. "You don't understand, you'll have to - "

"Mike," Sam sighed. "Whatever Larry gets up to is no longer your concern. You made a deal, remember? He's outta your life now for good. Besides, with a bit of luck, the bastard will end up as target practice for some Yemeni tribesman."

He really didn't think Sam was taking the matter seriously. He had seen Larry in a rage before and it was not pretty. The spy already had some sort of grudge against the SEAL and getting knocked out cold was only going to make that hatred grow.

"Hey, buddy," Sam's voice interrupted his thoughts. "Stop worrying about your past and start thinking about your future. You're gonna have to figure out a whole new way of doing things if you ever want to get out of Rayna Kopec's doghouse and back to work."

They had reached the aircraft and, before Michael could reply, he was being wheeled up a ramp and taken inside. _A whole new way of doing things_. He hadn't given much thought to anything other than becoming Lucy Chen's training officer.

He was still lost in his thoughts as Sam aided him out of the wheelchair and into his seat for the flight back home. He needed a whole new way of doing things not just to get out of Rayna Kopec's doghouse but to get free of always being known as Larry Sizemore's Kid.

"Hey, you o-kay, Mikey? You need any help with that seatbelt?"

"Huh? No, thanks, I'm fine," Michael mumbled, his mind filled with turmoil.

He sat in silence as the plane taxied down the runway before beginning to gain speed for take off.

_"You need me, Michael. You're not ready to be out there on your own. You think anybody else understands you the way I do? You need my experience, my contacts. You think you can fool them all into thinking you're some sort of Boy Scout? I see straight through you. You're a predator, just like me."_

As the plane gained altitude and headed out over the Ocean, Michael closed his eyes hoping to block out the voice filling his head. His hand, which was resting on his lap, strayed to his jacket pocket and he pulled out the blue case containing the medal. Snapping open the case, he stared down at the medal and the one word: "Valor." His fingers traced the raised letters, soothing him, settling his doubts.

_I'm nothing like you, Larry, and you don't know me at all._

The End...


End file.
